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THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 



THE 



BIGLOW PAPERS 



BY 

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. 



He to In (L-bitc'D, 
WITH A PREFACE 

BY THI. 

AUTHOR OF "TOM BROWN'S SCHOOL-DAYS. 



Reprinted, with the Author's Sanction, from the 
Fourth American Edition. 



LONDON : 

TRUBNER & CO. CO, PATERNOSTER ROW. 

1859. 



PS 2306 

■A) j 






LONDON : 
CLAY, PRINTER, BREAD STREET HILL 



3s 
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a i ? 



PUBLISHERS' PEEFACE. 



In order to avoid any misconception, the Publishers 
think it advisable to announce that the present 
Edition of the "Biglow Papers" is issued with the 
express sanction of the Author, granted by letter, 
from which the following is an extract : — 

" Cambridge, Massachusetts, 

14Jh September, 185 ( J. 

" I think it Mould be well for you to announce that you are 
to publish an Authorized Edition of the 'Biglow Papers;' 

for I have just received a letter from Mr. , who tells me 

that a Mr. was thinking of an edition, and wished him 

to edit it. Any such undertaking will be entirely against my 

will, and I take it for granted that Mr. only formed the 

plan in ignorance of your intention. 

" TVith many thanks, very truly yours, 

"J. Pi,. Lowell." 






ENGLISH EDITORS PREFACE. 



I can safely say that few things in my life have 
pleased me more than the request of Messrs. Triibner, 
backed by the expressed wish of the author, that 1 
would see the first English edition of the "Biglow 
Papers " through the press. I fell in with the Papers 
about ten years ago, soon after their publication ; and 
the impression they then made on me has been deepen- 
ing and becoming more lively ever since. In fact, I 
do not think that, even in his own New England, Mr. 
Lowell can have a more constant or more grateful 
reader, though I cannot say that I go much beyond 
most of my own intimate friends over here in my love 
for his works. I may remark, in passing, that the 
impossibility of keeping a copy of the "Biglow Papers" 



Vlll ENGLISH EDITOR S PREFACE. 

for more than a few weeks (of which many of us have 
had repeated and sorrowful proof l ) shows how much 
an English Edition is needed. 

Perhaps, strictly speaking, I should say a reprint, 
and not an edition. In fact, I am not clear (in spite 
of the wishes of author and publishers) that I have 
any right to call myself editor, for the book is as 
thoroughly edited already as a book need be. What 
between dear old Parson Wilbur — with his little 
vanities and pedantries, his " infinite faculty of 
sermonizing," his simplicity and humour, and his deep 
and righteous views of life, and power of hard hitting 
when he has anything to say which needs driving 
home — and Father Ezekiel, "the brown parchment- 
hided old man of the geoponic or bucolic species," 
"76 year old cum next tater diggin, and thair aint 
nowheres a kitting " (we readily believe) " spryer 'n 
he be;" and that judicious and lazy sub-editor, "Co- 



1 Should this meet the eye of any persons who may have forgotten to 
return American copies of the " Biglow Papers" to their respective owners, 
they are requested to forward them to the publishers. The strictest 
secrecy will be preserved, and an acknowledgment given in The Times if 
required. 



ENGLISH EDITOR S PREFACE. IX 

lumbus Nye, pastor of a church in Bungtown Corner," 
wliose acquaintance we make so thoroughly in the ten 
lines which he contributes — whatever of setting or 
framing was needed, or indeed possible, for the nine 
gems in verse of Mr. Hosea Biglow, has been so well 
done already in America by the hand best fitted for 
the task, that he must be a bold man who would 
meddle with the book now in the editing way. Even 
the humble satisfaction of adding a glossary and index 
has been denied to me, as there are already very good 
ones. I have merely added some half-dozen words to 
the glossary, at which I thought that English readers 
might perhaps stumble. When the proposal was first 
made to me, indeed, I thought of trying my hand at a 
sketch of American politics of thirteen years ago, the 
date of the Mexican war and of the first appearance of 
the " Biglow Papers." But I soon found out, first, 
that I was not, and had no ready means of making 
myself, competent for such a task ; secondly, that the 
book did not need it. The very slight knowledge which 
every educated Englishman has of Transatlantic politics 
will be quite enough to make him enjoy the racy 



X ENGLISH EDITOR'S PREFACE. 

smack of the American soil, which is one of their 
great charms ; and, as to the particular characters, 
they are most truly citizens of the world as well as 
Americans. If an Englishman cannot find ' Bird-o'-free- 
dom Sawins,' ' John P. Robinson's,' ' pious editors,' and 
candidates " facin' south-by-north " at home — ay, and 
if he is not conscious of his own individual propensity 
to the meannesses and duplicities of such, which come 
under the lash of Hosea — he knows little of the land 
we live in, or of his own heart, and is not worthy to 
read the " Biglow Papers." 

Instead, therefore, of any attempt of my own, I will 
give Mr. Lowell's own account of how and why he 
came to write this book. " All I can say is," he writes, 
" the book was thar. How it came is more than I can 
" tell. I cannot, like the great Go the, deliberately 
" imagine what would have been a proper ' Ent- 
" stehutigsweise' for my book, and then assume it as 
" fact. I only know that I believed our war with 
" Mexico (though we had as just ground for it as a 
e: strong nation ever had against a weak one) to be 
" essentially a war of false pretences, and that it would 



ENGLISH EDITORS PREFACE. XI 

" result in widening the boundaries, and so prolonging 
•• the life of slavery. Believing that it is the manifest 
" destiny of the English race to occupy this whole con- 
■• tinent, aud to display there that practical under- 

inding in matters of government and colonization 
u which no other race has given such proofs of pos- 
H sessing since the Romans, I hated to see a noble hope 
•• evaporated into a lying phrase to sweeten the foul 
•• breath of demagogues. Leaving the sin of it to God, 
•• I believed, and still believe, that slavery is the 
'• Achilles-heel of our own polity, that it is a temporary 
" and false supremacy of the white races, sure to 
" destroy that supremacy at last, because an enslaved 
u people always prove themselves of more enduring 
k - fibre than their enslavers, as not suffering from the 

Dial vices sure to be engendered by oppression in 
" the governing class. Against these and many other 

ings I thought all honest men should protest. I 
•' was born and bred in the country, and the dialect 

ua homely to me. I tried my first Biglow paper in 
'• a newspaper, and found that it had a great run. So 
•• I wrote the others from time to time during the 



Xll ENGLISH EDITORS PREFACE. 

" year which followed, always very rapidly, and some- 
" times (as with ' What Mr. Robinson thinks ') at one 
" sitting. When I came to collect them and publish 
" them in a volume, I conceived my parson-editor, with 
" his pedantry and verbosity, his amiable vanity and 
" superiority to the verses he was editing, as a fitting 
" artistic background and foil. He gave me the 
" chance, too, of glancing obliquely at many things 
" which were beyond the horizon of my other cha- 
" racters." 

There are two American books, elder brethren of 
" The Biglow Papers," which it would be unjust in 
an Englishman not to mention while introducing 
their big younger brother to his own countrymen, 
— I mean, of course, " Major Downing's Letters," and 
" Sam Slick ; " both of which are full of rare humour, 
and treat of the most exciting political questions of 
their day in a method and from points of view of 
which we are often reminded while reading the 
" Biglow Papers." In fact, Mr. Lowell borrows his 
name from the Major's Letters ; — " Zekel Bigelow, 
Broker and Banker of Wall Street, New York," is 



ENGLISH EDITORS PREFACE. Xlll 

the friend who corrects the spelling, and certifies to 
the genuineness, of the honest Major's effusions, 1 and 
is one of the raciest characters in the book. No one, 
I am sure, would be so ready as Mr. Lowell to ac- 
knowledge whatever obligations he may have to other 
men, and no one can do it more safely. For though 
he may owe a name or an idea to others, he seems 
to me to stand quite alone amongst Americans, and 
to be the only one who is beyond question entitled 
to take his place in the first rank, by the side of 
the great political satirists of ancient and modern 
Europe. 

( Greece had her Aristophanes ; Rome her Juvenal ; 
Spain has had her Cervantes ; France her Rabelais, her 
Moliere, her Voltaire ; Germany her Jean Paul, her 
Heine j England her Swift, her Thackeray \ and America 
has her Lowell. By the side of all those great masters 
of satire, though kept somewhat in the rear by pro- 
vincialism of style and subject, the author of the 
" Biglow Papers 1 ' holds his own place distinct from 



1 See the English Edition of " Letters of Major Downing," published 
by John Murray in 1S35, pp. 22, 23; and Letters x. xi. xii. and xv. 



XIV ENGLISH EDITOR S PREFACE. 

each and all. The man who reads the book for the 
first time, and is capable of understanding it, has 
received a new sensation. In Lowell the American 
mind has for the first time flowered out into thoroughly 
original genius. 

There is an airy grace about the best pieces of 
Washington Irving, which has no parallel amongst 
English writers, however closely modelled may be his 
style upon that of the Addisonian age. There is 
much original power, which will perhaps be better 
appreciated at a future day, about Fenimore Cooper's 
delineations of the physical and spiritual border-land, 
between white and red, between civilization and 
savagery. There is dramatic power of a high order 
about Mr. Hawthorne, though mixed with a certain 
morbidness and bad taste, which debar him from ever 
attaining to the first rank. There is an originality of 
position about Mr. Emerson, in his resolute setting 
up of King Self against King Mob, which, coupled 
with a singular metallic glitter of style, and plenty 
of shrewd New England mother-wit, have made up 
together one of the best counterfeits of genius that 



ENGLISH EDITORS PREFACE. XV 

has been seen for many a day j so good, indeed, 
that most men are taken by it for the first quarter 
of an hour at the least. But for real unmistakable 
genius, — for that glorious fulness of power which 
knocks a man down at a blow for sheer admira- 
tion, and then makes him rush into the arms of the 
knocker- down, and swear eternal friendship with him 
for sheer delight ; the "Biglow Papers" stand alone. 

If I sought to describe their characteristics, I should 
say, the most exuberant and extravagant humour, 
coupled with strong, noble, Christian purpose, — a 
thorough scorn for all that is false and base, all the 
more withering because of the thorough geniality of 
the writer. Perhaps Jean Paul is of all the satirists 
I have named the one who at bottom presents mos 
affinity with Lowell, but the differences are marked. 
The intellectual sphere of the German is vaster, but 
though with certain aims before him, he rather floats 
and tumbles about like a porpoise at play than follows 
any direct perceptible course. With Lowell, on the 
contrary, every word tells, every laugh is a blow j as 
if the god Momus had turned out as Mars, and were 



XVI ENGLISH EDITORS PREFACE. 

hard at work fighting every inch of him, grinning his 
broadest all the while. 

Will some English readers be shocked by this com- 
bination of broad and keen humour with high Christian 
purpose — the association of humour and Christianity ? 
I hope not. At any rate, I would remind any such 
of Luther, and of our own Latimer and Rowland Hill ; 
are they prepared to condemn them and many more 
like them 1 Nay (though it is a question which can 
only be hinted at here), does not the Bible itself sanc- 
tion the combination by its own example ? Is there 
not humour mixed with the tremendous sarcasm of 
the old prophets — dread humour no doubt, but humour 
unmistakably — wherever they speak of the helplessness 
of idols, as in the forty-fourth and forty-sixth chapters 
of Isaiah, and in Elijah's mockery of the priests of 
Baal : — " Cry aloud, for he is a God ; either he is 
talking, or he is pursuing, or he is on a journey, or 
peradventure he sleepeth, and must be awakened." Is 
not the book of Proverbs full of grave, dry, pungent 
humour 1 Consider only the following passage out of 
many of the same spirit : " As the door turneth upon 



ENGLISH EDITORS FREFACE. xvii 

his hinges, so doth the slothful upon his bed. The 
slothful hideth his hand in his bosom, it grieveth 
him to bring it again to his mouth. The sluggard 
is wiser in his own conceit than seven men that can 
render a reason. He that passeth by and meddleth 
with strife belonging not to him, is like one that 
taketh a dog by the ears." — Prov. xxvi. 1-i — 17. 

Or if it be objected that these things belong to an 
earlier covenant, that laughter and jesting are "not 
convenient" under the Gospel of Him who came not 
to destroy the law but to fulfil it, there is, perhaps, an 
answer to this also. 

For a specimen of subdued humour in narrative, 
adhering in the most literal manner to facts, and yet 
contriving to bring them out by that graphic literal- 
ness under their most ludicrous aspect, what can 
equal St. Luke's description of the riot at Ephesus? 
The picture of the narrow trade selfishness of Deme- 
trius — of polytheism reduced into a matter of busi- 
ness — of the inanity of a mob tumult in an enslaved 
country — of the mixed coaxing and bullying of its 
officials, was surely never brought out with a more 
6 



XV111 ENGLISH EDITORS PREFACE. 

vivid sense of the absurdity of the whole. u And 
Gallio cared for none of these things," is another 
touch of quiet humour, which at once brings out 
the ludicrous aspect of the punishment of the Jewish 
agitators by means of the very tumults which they 
raised. 

I take it, therefore, that the exhibition of humour, 
in the pursuit, and as an aid for the attainment of a 
noble Christian purpose, is a means of action not only 
sanctioned by the very constitution of our natures (in 
which God has implanted so deeply the sense of the 
ludicrous, surely not that we might root it out) but, 
by the very example of Holy Writ. The humour exhi- 
bited may be different in degree and in quality ; the 
skies of Syria are not those of Germany, or of Spain, 
of England, whether old or new. But the gift in 
itself is a pure and precious one, if lawfully and right- 
fully used. 

Military braggadocio, political and literary humbug, 
and slave-holding, are the three great butts at which 
Hosea Biglow and Parson Wilbur shoot, at point-blank 
range, and with shafts drawn well to the ear. The 



ENGLISH EDITOR S PREFACE. xix 

latter vice, indeed, includes both the others, or rather 
uses them as its instruments. Thus, the " pious 
Editor" proclaims, as his creed, — 

I du believe in Freedom's cause 

Ez fur away ez Paris is ; 
I love to see her stick her claws 

In them infarnal Pharisees ; 

It's wal enough agin a king 

To dror resolves and triggers, 
But libbaty's a kind o' thing 

Thet dont agree with niggers. 

No doubt they go further than this. I am quite 
aware that Mr. Lowell will be claimed as a champion 
by the peace party in this country ; and certainly no 
keener things have been said against war in general 
than are to be found in this book. 

With our own peace- at-any-price party, no one has 
less sympathy than I ; and this leads me to urge on 
all English readers to bear in mind, that the " Biglow 
Papers " were written for a New England audience, by 
a New Englander, and must be judged from a New 
England point of view. The citizen of a huge young 
mammoth country, divided by a whole ocean from the 
nearest enemy that it could fear, assailable only on the 
62 



XX ENGLISH EDITOR S PREFACE. 

fringe of its seaboard (itself consisting chiefly of unap- 
proachable swamp or barren sand wastes), surrounded 
by weak neighbours or thin wandering hordes, only too 
easy to bully, to subdue, to eat up ; from which bands 
of pirates, under the name of liberators, swarm forth 
year after year, almost unchecked, to neighbouring 
lands, and to which if defeated they only return to be 
caressed and applauded by their congeners ; where 
the getting up of war- fevers forms part of the stock in 
trade of too many of the leading politicians ; where in 
particular the grasping at new territories for slave 
labour, by means however foul, has become the special 
and avowed policy of the slavery party ; the citizen of 
such a country has a right to tell his countrymen 
that — 

'T'aint your eppyletts an' feathers 

Make the thing a grain more right ; 
"Faint afollerin your bell-wethers 

Will excuse ye in His sight ; 

'Ef you take a sword an' dror it, 

An' go stick a feller thru, 
'Guv'ment aint to answer for it, 

God '11 send the hill to you. 

And the bravest officer in Her Majesty's service will 
laugh as heartily as you will, I take it, my dear reader, 



ENGLISH EDITOR S PREFACE. XXI 



if you have never heard it before, over a picture and a 
contrast such as the following : — 



Farson Wilbur sez, he never heerd in his life 

Thet th' Apostles rigged out in their swaller-tail coats, 
An' marched round in front of a drum and a fife 
To git, some on 'em. office, an some on em votes, 
But John P 
Robinson he 
Sez they didnt know everythin' down in Juddee. 



But England is a small and wealthy country, whose 
best defence against a neighbour, always likely to be- 
come a foe, consists in a mere ocean canal j where the 
question, I will not say of war, but of readiness for war, 
is one of life or death — in which the temptation, always 
so strong, to subordinate national honour to what is 
supposed to be policy, is in our day for most statesmen 
almost irresistible, because political influence is so 
evenly balanced, that a peace party of perhaps twenty 
votes has often the destinies of a ministry in its hands. 
Had Mr. Lowell been an Englishman, no one who 
knows his writings can believe for a moment that he 
would have swelled the cry or strengthened the hands 
of the vain and mischievous clique, who amongst us 



xxii ENGLISH EDITOR'S PREFACE. 

have of late years raised the cry of peace when there is 
no peace. 

The same caution will apply to our marked pecu- 
liarity of style in the book, which may offend at first 
many persons otherwise most capable of entering into 
its spirit. I mean the constant, and so to speak, per- 
vading use of Scripture language and incidents, not 
only side by side with the most grotesque effusions of 
humour, but as one main element of the ludicrous 
effects produced. This undoubtedly would be as really 
offensive as it would be untrue, from any other point 
of view perhaps than that of a New Englander bred in 
the country. The rural population of New England is 
still, happily for itself, tinctured in all its language, 
habits, modes of feeling and thought, by a strict Scrip- 
tural training — " Out of the fulness of the heart the 
mouth speaketh." Look below the surface and you 
will see that there is no irreverence whatever beneath 
Hosea Biglow's daring use of Scripture ; only that "per- 
fect love which casteth out fear ;" that the very purpose 
of the whole book is to set up Christ's Gospel as the 
standard by which alone all men are to be judged in 



ENGLISH EDITORS PREFACE. xxiii 

all their acts. We may disagree from him in the con- 
clusions which he draws from Scripture j of his earnest 
sincerity in enforcing those conclusions we cannot 
doubt. 

It is satisfactory, indeed, to think that Mr. Lowell's 
shafts have already, in a great measure, ceased to be 
required, or would have to be aimed now at other 
bull's eyes. The servility of the Northern States to the 
South, which twelve years ago so raised his indignation, 
has well nigh ceased to be. The vital importance of 
the slavery question is now thoroughly recognized by 
the great republican party, which I trust is year by 
year advancing towards an assured victory. 

For that victory Mr. Lowell has done knightV 
service by his other works, as well as by the 
"Biglow Papers." I need not do more than refer 
to these, however, as they have been published in 
a cheap form over here, and I believe have circulated 
largely. In his other poems he is by no means so 
equal as in the "Biglow Papers;" but I cannot 
help thinking that (leaving out of sight altogether 
his satirical works) fifty years hence he will be 



XXIV ENGLISH EDITOR S PREFACE. 

recognized as the greatest American poet of our day, 
notwithstanding the contemporary judgment which 
has in England, and I believe in America, assigned 
that proud place to his friend and predecessor at 
Harvard College, H. W. Longfellow. To any reader 
who has not met with Lowell's Poems, and who 
may be induced to read them after a perusal of 
the present volume, I should recommend " The 
Vision of Sir Launfal," " A Parable," " Stanzas on 
Freedom," " The Present Crisis," and " Hunger and 
Cold," as specially fit to be read in connexion with 
the "Biglow Papers." It is only by looking at all 
sides of a man of this mould that you can get a 
notion of his size and power. Readers, therefore, 
should search out for themselves the exquisite little 
gems of a lighter kind, which lie about in the other 
poems comprised in the volume. I am only indicat- 
ing those which, as it seems to me, when taken 
with the "Biglow Papers," give the best idea of 
the man, and what his purpose in life has been, 
and is. 

I will not think so badly of my countrymen as to 



ENGLISH EDITORS TREFACE. XXV 

suppose for a moment that "The Biglow Papers" will 
not become the intimate friends of all good fellows in 
England ; and when we have really made friends with 
a book, we like to know something about our friend's 
father ; so I shall add the little I know of the history 
of James Russell Lowell. 

He was born in 1819, at Cambridge, Massachusetts, 
so that he is some years younger than our own laureate, 
and we may hope to get out of him many another 
noble work, though we shall get no more "Biglow 
Papers " — at least I fear not ; for the sort of inspira- 
tion which finds voice in this way comes, I take it, only 
once in a man's life. And moreover, this is his own 
conviction. In a letter which I received from him as 
to the present publication, he writes: " Friendly people 
say to me sometimes, 'Write us more "Biglow Papers;" ' 
and I have even been simple enough to try, only to 
find that I could not. This has helped to persuade me 
that the book was a genuine growth, and not a manu- 
facture, and that therefore I had an honest right to be 
pleased without blushing, if people liked it." He was 
educated at Harvard College, Cambridge ; and, in fact, 



XXVI ENGLISH EDITORS PREFACE. 

has never lived away from his native place. He read 
law, but never practised ; and in 1 855 was chosen to 
succeed Longfellow as Professor of Modern Literature 
in Harvard College. He has visited Europe twice; 
and I am sure that every one who knows his works 
must join with me in the hearty wish that he may 
come among us again as soon as possible. 






CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

PUBLISHERS PREFACE V 



EDITOR S PREFACE VU 

NOTICES OF AH INDEPENDENT PRESS Xxix 

Xo. I. 

A LETTER FROM MR. EZEKIEL BIGLOW OF JAALAM TO THE 
HON. JOSEPH T. BUCKINGHAM, EDITOR OF THE BOSTON 
COURIER, INCLOSING A POEM OF HIS SON, MR. HOSEA 
BIGLOW 1 

No. II. 

A LETTER FROM MR. HOSEA BIGLOW TO THE HON. J. T. BUCK- 
INGHAM, EDITOR OF THE BOSTON COURIER, COVERING 
A LETTER FROM MR. B. SAWIN, PRIVATE IN THE MAS- 
SACHUSETTS REGIMENT 11 

No. III. 
WHAT MR. ROBINSON THINKS 27 



XXV111 CONTENTS. 

No. IV. 

PAGE 

REMARKS OF INCREASE D. O'PHACE, ESQUIRE, AT AN EX- 
TRUMPERY CAUCUS IN STATE STREET, REPORTED BY 
MR. H. BIGLOW 40 

No. V. 

THE DEBATE IN THE SENNIT. SOT TO A NUSRY RHYME . 55 

No. VI. 

THE PIOUS EDITOR'S CREED 64 

No. VII. 

A LETTER FROM A CANDIDATE FOR THE PRESIDENCY IN 
ANSWER TO SUTTIN QUESTIONS PROPOSED BY MR. HOSEA 
BIGLOW, INCLOSED IN A NOTE FROM MR. BIGLOW TO S. H. 
GAY, ESQ., EDITOR OF THE NATIONAL ANTISLAVERY 
STANDARD 74 

No. VIII. 

A SECOND LETTER FROM B. SAWIN, ESQ 86 

No. IX. 

A THIRD LETTER FROM B. SAWIN, ESQ 106 

GLOSSARY 127 

INDEX 131 



NOTICES OF AN INDEPENDENT PEESS. 



[I have observed, reader, (bene- or niale-volent, as it may 
happen,) that it is customary to append to the second editions 
of books, and to the second works of authors, short sentences 
commendatory of the first, under the title of Notices of the 
Press. These, I have been given to understand, are procurable 
at certain established rates, payment being made either in 
money or advertising patronage by the publisher, or by an 
adequate outlay of servility on the part of the author. Con- 
sidering these things with myself, and also that such notices 
are neither intended, nor generally believed, to convey any real 
opinions, being a purely ceremonial accompaniment of litera- 
ture, and resembling certificates to the virtues of various mor- 
biferal panaceas, I conceived that it would be not only more 
economical to prepare a sufficient number of such myself, but 
also more immediately subservient to the end in view, to prefix 
them to this our primary edition, rather than await the contin- 
gency of a second, when they would seem to be of small 
utility. To delay attaching the bobs until the second attempt 
at flying the kite would indicate but a slender experience in 
that useful art. Neither has it escaped my notice, nor failed 
to afford me matter of reflection, that, when a. circus or a cara- 
van is about to visit Jaalam, the initial step-is to send forward 
large and highly ornamented bills of performance to be hung in 
the bar-room aud the post-office. These having been suffi- 



XXX NOTICES OF AN INDEPENDENT PRESS. 

ciently gazed at, and beginning to lose their attractiveness 
except for the flies, and, truly, the boys also, (in whom I find 
it impossible to repress, even during school-hours, certain oral 
and telegraphic correspondences concerning the expected show,) 
upon some fine morning the band enters in a gaily-painted 
waggon, or triumphal chariot, and with noisy advertisement, 
by means of brass, wood, and sheepskin, makes the circuit of 
our startled village-streets. Then, as the exciting sounds draw 
nearer and nearer, do I desiderate those eyes of Aristarchus, 
"whose looks were as a breeching to a boy." Then do I 
perceive, with vain regret of wasted opportunities, the advan- 
tage of a pancratic or pantechnic education, since he is most 
reverenced by my little subjects who can throw the cleanest 
summerset, or walk most securely upon the revolving cask. 
The story of the Pied Piper becomes for the first time credible 
to me, (albeit confirmed by the Hameliners dating their legal 
instruments from the period of his exit,) as I behold how those 
strains, without pretence of magical potency, bewitch the pu- 
pillary legs, nor leave to the pedagogic an entire self-control. 
For these reasons, lest my kingly prerogative should suffer 
diminution, I prorogue my restless commons, whom I also 
follow into the street, chiefly lest some mischief may chance 
befall them. After the manner of such a band, I send forward 
the following notices of domestic manufacture, to make brazen 
proclamation, not unconscious of the advantage which will 
accrue, if our little craft, cymbula sutilis, shall seem to leave 
port with a clipping breeze, and to carry, in nautical phrase, 
a bone in her mouth. Nevertheless, I have chosen, as being 
more equitable, to prepare some also sufficiently objurgatory, 
that readers of every taste may find a dish to their palate. I 
have modelled them upon actually existing specimens, preserved 
in my own cabinet of natural curiosities. One, in particular, 
I had copied with tolerable exactness from a notice of one of 






NOTICES OF AN INDEPENDENT PRESS. XXX i 

my own discourses, which, from its superior tone and appear- 
ance of vast experience, I concluded to have been written by 
a man at leasl three hundred years of age, though I recollected 
no existing instance of such antediluvian longevity. Never- 
theless, I afterwards discovered the author to be a young 
gentleman preparing for the ministry under the direction of one 
of my brethren in a neighbouring town, and whom I had once 
instinctively corrected in a Latin quantity. But this I have 
been forced to omit, from its too great length. — H. W.] 



From the Universal Littery Universe. 

Full of passages which rivet the attention of the reader. . . . Under a 
rustic garb, sentiments are conveyed which should be committed to the 
memory and engraven on the heart of every moral and social being. . . . 
We consider this a unique performance. ... We hope to see it soon in- 
troduced into our common schools Mr. Wilbur has performed his 

duties as editor with excellent taste and judgment. . . . This is a vein 
which we hope to see successfully prosecuted. . . . We hail the appearance 
of this work as a long stride toward the formation of a purely aboriginal, 
indigenous, native, and American literature. We rejoice to meet with an 
author national enough to break away from the slavish deference, too 
common among us, to English grammar and orthography. . . . Where all 
good, we are at a loss how to make extracts. ... On the whole, we 
may call it a volume which no library, pretending to entire completeness, 
should fail to place upon its shelves. 



From the Eigrjinboltoniopolis Suapping-turtle. 

A collection of the merest balderdash and doggerel that it was ever our 
bad fortune to lay eyes on. The author is a vulgar buffoon, and the editor 
a talkative, tedious old fool. We use strong language, but should any of 
our readers peruse the book, (from which calamity Heaven preserve them,) 
they will find reasons for it thick as the leaves of Yallumbrozer, or, to use 



XXX11 NOTICES OF AN INDEPENDENT PRESS. 

a still more expressive comparison, as the combined heads of author and 
editor. The work is wretchedly got up. . . . We should like to know how 
much British gold was pocketed by this libeller of our country and her 
purest patriots. 



From the Oldfogrumville Mentor. 

We have not had time to do more than glance through this handsomely 
printed volume, but the name of its respectable editor, the .Rev. Mr. 
Wilbur, of Jaalam, will afford a sufficient guaranty for the worth of its 
contents. . . . The paper is white, the type clear, and the volume of a con- 
venient and attractive size. ... In reading this elegantly executed work, 
it has seemed to us that a passage or two might have been retrenched with 
advantage, and that the general style of diction was susceptible of a higher 

polish On the whole, we may safely leave the ungrateful task of 

criticism to the reader. We will barely suggest, that in volumes intended, 
as this is, for the illustration of a provincial dialect and turns of expres- 
sion, a dash of humour or satire might be thrown in with advantage. . . . 
The work is admirably got up. . . . This work will form an appropriate 
ornament to the centre-table. It is beautifully printed, on paper of an 
excellent quality. 



From the Dekay Bulwark. 

We should be wanting in our duty as the conductor of that tremendous 
engine, a public press, as an American, and as a man, did we allow such 
an opportunity as is presented to us by " The Biglow Papers " to pass by 
without entering our earnest protest against such attempts (now, alas ! too 
common) at demoralizing the public sentiment. Under a wretched mask 
of stupid drollery, slavery, war, the social glass, and, in short, all the 
valuable and time-honoured institutions justly dear to our common 
humanity and especially to republicans, are made the butt of coarse and 
senseless ribaldry by this low-minded scribbler. It is time that the re- 
spectable and religious portion of our community should be aroused to the 
alarming inroads of foreign Jacobinism, sansculottism, and infidelity. It 
is a fearful proof of the wide-spread nature of this contagion, that these 
secret stabs at religion and virtue are given from uuder the cloak {credite, 
vosteri!) of a clergyman. It is a mournful spectacle indeed to the patriot 
and Christian to see liberality and new ideas (falsely so called, — they are 



NOTICES OF AN INDEPENDENT PRESS. XXX111 

as old as £den"> invading the sacred precincts of the pulpit On the 

whole, we consider this volume as one of the first shocking results which 
we predicted would spring out of the late French "Revolution " (!). 



From the Bung/own Copper and Comprehensive Tocsin (a trytceakly 
family journal). 

Altogether an admirable work Full of humour, boisterous, but 

delicate, — of wit withering and scorching, yet combined with a pathos 
cool as morning dew, — of satire ponderous as the mace of Richard, yet 
keen as the scymitar of Saladin. ... A work full of "mountain-mirth," 

mischievous as Tuck and lightsome as Ariel We know not whether 

to admire most the genial, fresh, and discursive concinnity of the author, 
or his playful fancy, weird imagination, and compass of style, at once both 

objective and subjective We might indulge in some criticisms, but, 

were the author other than he is. he would be a different being. As it is, 
he has a wonderful pose, which flits from flower to flower, and bears the 
reader irresistibly along on its eagle pinions (like Ganymede) to the 
M highest heaven of invention." .... We love a book so purely objective. 
. . . Many of his pictures of natural scenery have an extraordinary sub- 
jective clearness and fidelity In fine, we consider this as one of the 

most extraordinary volumes of tins or any age. We know of no English 
author who could have written it. It is a work to which the proud genius 
of our country, standing with one foot on the Aroostook and the other on 
the Rio Grande, and holding up the star-spangled banner amid the wreck 
of matter and the crush of worlds, may point with bewildering scorn of 

the punier efforts of enslaved Europe We hope soon to encounter 

our author among those higher walks of literature in which he is evidently 
capable of achieving enduring fame. Already we should be inclined to 
assign him a high position in the bright galaxy of our American bards. 



From the Salt river Pilot and Flay of Freedom. 

A volume in bad grammar and worse taste While the pieces here 

collected were confined to their appropriate sphere in the corners of obscure 

newspapers, we considered them wholly beneath contempt, but, as the 

author has chosen to come forward in this public manner, he must expect 

C 



XXXIV NOTICES OF AN INDEPENDENT PRESS. 

the lash he so richly merits. . . . Contemptible slanders. . . . Vilest Bil- 
lingsgate. . . . Has raked all the gutters of our language The most 

pure, upright, and consistent politicians not safe from his malignant 
venom. . . . General Cushing comes in for a share of his vile calumnies. . 
.... The Reverend Homer Wilbur is a disgrace to his cloth. . . . 



From the World-Harmonic- JEolian- Attachment. 

Speech is silver ; silence is golden. No utterance more Orphic than 
this. While, therefore, as highest author, we reverence him whose works 
continue heroically unwritten, we have also our hopeful word for those 
who with pen (from wing of goose loud- cackling, or seraph God-commis- 
sioned) record the thing that is revealed Under mask of quaintest 

irony, we detect here the deep , storm-tost (nigh shipwracked) soul, thunder- 
scarred, semiarticulate, but ever climbing hopefully toward the peaceful 

summits of an Infinite Sorrow Yes, thou poor, forlorn Hosea, with 

Hebrew fire-flaming soul in thee, for thee also this life of ours has not 
been without its aspect of heavenliest pity and laughingest mirth. Con- 
ceivable enongh ! Through coarse Thersites-cloak, we have revelation of 
the heart, wild-glowing, world-clasping, that is in him. Bravely he grap- 
ples with the life-problem as it presents itself to him, uncombed, shaggy, 
careless of the " nicer proprieties," inexpert of " elegant diction," yet with 
voice audible enough to whoso hath ears, up there on the gravelly side- 
hills, or down on the splashy, Indiarubber-like salt-marshes of native 
Jaalam. To this soul also the 'Necessity of Creating somewhat has un- 
veiled its awful front. If not CEdipuses" and Electras and Alcestises, then 
in God's name Birdofredum Sawins ! These also shall get born into the 
world, and filch ' (if so need) a Zingali subsistence therein, these lank, 
omnivorous Yankees of his. He shall paint the Seen, since the Unseen 
will not sit to him. Yet in him also are Mbelungen-lays, and Iliads, and 
Ulysses-wanderings, and Divine Comedies, — if only once he could come at 
them ! Therein lies much, nay all; for what truly is this which we name 
All, but that which we do not possess ? . . . Glimpses also are given us of 
an old father Ezekiel, not without paternal pride, as is the wont of such. 
A brown, parchment-hided old man of the geoponic or bucolic species, 
gray-eyed, we fancy, queued perhaps, with much weather-cunning and 
plentiful September-gale memories, bidding fair in good time to become 
the Oldest Inhabitant. After such hasty apparition, he vanishes and is 
seen no more Of " Bev. Homer Wilbur, A. M., Pastor of the First 



NOTICES OF AX INDEPENDENT PRESS. XXXV 

Church in Jaalam," we have small care to speak here. Spare touch in 
him of his Melesigenes namesake, save, haply, the — blindness ! A 
tolerably caliginose, nephclegeretous elderly gentleman, with infinite 
faculty of sermonizing, muscularized by long practice, and excellent 
digestive apparatus, and, for the rest, well-meaning enough, and with 
small private illuminations (somewhat tallowy, it is to be feared) of 
his own. To him, there, "Pastor of the First Church in Jaalam," 
our Hosea presents himself as a quiet inexplicable Sphinx-riddle. A 
rich poverty of Latin and Greek, — so far is clear enough, even to 
eyes peering myopic through horn-lensed editorial spectacles, — hut 
naught farther? O purblind, well-meaning, altogether fuscous Mele- 
sigeues-TTilbur, there are things in him incommunicable by stroke of 
birch ! Did it ever enter that old bewildered head of thine that there was 
the Possihilihi of the Infinite in him? To thee, quite wingless (and even 
featherless) biped, has not so much even as a dream of wings ever come ? 
' • Talented young parishioner " ? Among the Arts whereof thou art 
• 'cr, does that of seeing happen to be one ? Unhappy Artium 
Magister ! Somehow a Nemean lion, fidvous, torrid-eyed, dry-nursed in 
broad-howling sand-wildernesses of a sufficiently rare spirit- Libya (it may 
be supposed) has got whelped among the sheep. Already he stands wild- 
glaring, with feet clutching the ground as with oak-roots, gathering for a 
Remus-spring over the walls of thy little fold. In Heaven's name, go 
not near him with that flybite crook of thine! In good time, thou painful 
preacher, thou wilt go to the appointed place of departed Artillery- 
Election Sermons, Right-Hands of Fellowship, and Results of Councils, 
gathered to thy spiritual fathers with much Latin of the Epitaphial sort ; 
thou, too, shalt have thy reward ; but on him the Eumenides have looked, 
not Xantippes of the pit, snake-tressed, finger-threatening, but radiantly 
calm as on antique gems ; for him paws impatient the winged courser of 
the gods, champing unwelcome bit : him the starry deeps, the empyrean 
glooms, and far-flashing splendors await. 



From the Onion Grove Phccni.- . 

A talented young townsman of ours, recently returned from a Conti- 
nental tour, and who is already favourably known to our readers by bia 
sprightly letters from abroad which have graced our columns, called at our 
office yesterday. We learn from him, that, having enjoyed the distinguished 

c2 



XXXVI NOTICES OF AN INDEPENDENT PRESS. 

privilege, while in Germany, of an introduction to the celebrated Von 
Humbug, he took the opportunity to present that eminent man with a 
copy of the " Biglow Papers." The next morning he received the follow- 
ing note, which he has kindly furnished us for publication. We prefer to 
print verbatim, knowing that our readers will readily forgive the few errors 
into which the illustrious writer has fallen, through ignorance of our 
language. 

" High-Worthy Mister! 

" I shall also now especially happy starve, because I have more or less 
a work of one those aboriginal Red- Men seen in which have 1 so deaf an 
interest ever taken fullworthy on the self shelf with our Gottsched to be 
upset. 

" Pardon my in the English-speech unpractice ! 

" Von Humbug." 



He also sent with the above note a copy of his famous work on " Cos- 
metics," to be presented to Mr. Biglow ; but this was taken from our 
friend by the English custom-house officers, probably through a petty 
national spite. No doubt, it has by this time found its way into the 
British Museum. We trust this outrage will be exposed in all our Ameri- 
can papers. We shall do our best to bring it to the notice of the State 
Department. Our numerous readers will share in the pleasure we experi- 
ence at seeing our young and vigorous national literature thus encourag- 
ingly patted on the head by this venerable and world-renowned German. 
We love to see these reciprocations of good-feeling between the different 
branches of the great Anglo-Saxon race. 



From the Jaalam Independent Blunderbuss. 

.... But, while we lament to see our young townsman thus mingling 
in the heated contests of party politics, we think we detect in him the 
presence of talents which, if properly directed, might give an innocent 
pleasure to many. As a proof that he is competent to the production of 
other kinds of poetry, we copy for our readers a short fragment of a pas- 
toral by him, the manuscript of which was loaned us by a friend. The 
title of it is " The Courtin'." 



NOTICES OF AN INDEPENDENT PRESS. XXXV11 

Zekle crep' up, quite unbeknown, 

An' peeked in tliru the winder, 
An' there sot Huldy all aloue, 

'ith no one nigh to heuder. 

Agin' the cliimbly crooknecks hung, 

An' in amongst 'era rusted 
The ole queen's arm thet gran'ther Young 

Fetched back frura Coucord busted. 

The wannut logs shot sparkles out 

Towards the pootiest, bless her! 
Au' leetle fires danced all about 

The cliiny on the dresser. 

The very room, coz she wuz in, 

Looked warm frurn floor to ceilin', 
An' she looked full ez rosy agin 

Ez til' apples she wuz peelin'. 

She heerd a foot an' knowed it, tu, 

Araspin' on the scraper, — 
All ways to once her feelins flew 

Like sparks in burnt-up paper. 

He kin' o' l'itered on the mat, 

Some doubtfle o' the seekle ; 
His heart kep' goin' pitypat, 

But hern went pity Zekle. 



XXXV111 NOTICES OF AN INDEPENDENT PRESS. 



Satis multis sese emptores futuros libri professis, Georgius 
Nichols, Cantabrigiensis, opus emittet de parte gravi sed 
adhuc neglecta historian naturalis, cum titulo sequenti, vide- 
licet : — 



ad Delineationem naturalem nonnihil perfectiorem 
Scarabcei Bombilatoris, vulgo dicti Humbug, ab Homero 
Wilbur, Artium Magistro, Societatis historico - naturalis 
Jaallamensis Prseside, (Secretario, Socioque (eheu!) singulo,) 
multarumque aliarum Societatum eruditarum (sive inerudi- 
tarum) tarn domesticaram quam transmarinarum Socio — 
forsitan future 

PROEMIUM. 

Lectori Benevolo S. 

Toga scholastica nondum deposita, quum systemata varia 
entomologica, a viris ejus scientise cultoribus studiosissimis 
summa diligentia eedificata, penitus indagassem, nou fuit quia 
luctuose omnibus iu iis, quamvis aliter laude dignissimis, 
hiatum magni momenti perciperem. Tunc, nescio quo motu 
superiore impulsus, aut qua captus dulcedine operis, ad eum 
implendum (Curtius alter) me solemniter devovi. Nee ab isto 
labore, haifxovioos imposito, abstinui antequam tractatulum 
sufficienter inconcinnum lingua vernacula perfeceram. Inde, 
juveniliter tumefactus, et barathro ineptise tg>v (Si(S\ioTra>kcov 
(necnon " Publici Legentis ") nusquam explorato, me compo- 
suisse quod quasi placentas prsefervidas (ut sic dicam) bo- 



NOTICES OF AX INDEPENDENT PRESS. XXXIX 

mines ingaigitarent crcdidi. Scd, qumn huic et alii bibliopohe 
MSS. mea submisisscm ct niliil solidius responsione valde nega- 
tiva in Mussum mcuni retiilissem, horror ingens atqiie 
miscricordia, ob crassitudinem Lambertianam in cercbris 
honmnculorum istius mimeris coelesti quadam ira infixam, me 
invascre. Extcmplo niei solins impensis librum edere decrevi, 
nihil oimiino dubitans qnin "Mundus Scientificus " (ut ainnt) 
crumcnam meam ampliter repleret. NuUam, attamcn, ex agro 
illo mco parvulo segetcm demessui, prater gaudium vacuum 
bene dc Rcpublica merendi. Iste panis meus pretiosus super 
aquas litcrarias feculent as prtefidenter jactus, quasi Harpy- 
iarum quarmidam (scilicet bibliopolarum istorum facinoro- 
sorum supradictorum) tactu rancidus, intra perpaucos dies 
mihi domum rediit. Et, quum ipse tali victu ali non tolerarem, 
primum in mentem vcuit pistori (typographo nempe) nihilo- 
minus solvendum esse. Animum non idcirco demisi, imo 
a?que ac pucri naviculas suas penes se lino retinent (eo ut e 
recto cursu delapsas ad ripam retrahant), sic ego Argo meam 
ehartaceam fluctibus laborantem a quaesitu velleris aurei, ipse 
potius tonsus pelleque exutus, mente solida revocavi. Meta- 
phoram ut mat em, boomarangam meam a scopo aberrantem 
retraxi, dum majore vi, occasione ministrante, adversus Fortu- 
nam mtorquerem. Ast mihi, talia volventi, et, sicut 
Saturnus ille Traidoftopos, liberos intellectus mei depascere 
fidenti, casus miserandus, nee antea inauditus, supervenit. 
Nam, ut ferunt Scythas pietatis causa et parsimonise, pa- 
rentes suos mortuos devorasse, sic filius hie meus primo- 
genitus, Scythis ipsis minus mansuetus, patrem vivum totum 
et calcitrant em exsorbere enixus est. Kec tamen hac de causa 
sobolem meam esurientem exheredavi. Sed famem istam pro 
valido testimonio virilitatis roborisque potius habui, cibumque 
ad earn satiandam, salva paterna mea came, petii. Et quia 
bilem illam scaturientcra ad ses etiam concoquendum idoneam 



Xl NOTICES OP AN INDEPENDENT PRESS. 

esse estimabam, unde ses alienum, ut minoris pretii, haberem, 
circumspexi. Rebus ita se habentibus, ab avunculo meo 
Johanne Doolittle, Armigero, impetravi ut pecunias neces- 
sarias suppeditaret, ne opus esset mini universitatem relin- 
quendi antequam ad gradum primum in artibus pervenissem. 
Tunc ego, salvum faeere patronum meum munificum maxime 
cupiens, omnes libros primae editionis operis mei non venditos 
una cum privilegio in omne sevum ejusdem impriinendi et 
edendi avunculo meo dicto pigneravi. Ex illo die, atro lapide 
notando, curse vociferantes familise singulis annis crescentis 
eo usque insultabant ut nunquam tarn carum pignus e vinculis 
istis aheneis solvere possem. 

Avunculo vero nuper mortuo, quum inter alios consan- 
guineos testamenti ejus lectionem audiendi causa advenissem, 
erectis auribus verba talia sequentia accepi : — " Quoniam per- 
suasum habeo meum dilectum nepotem Homerum, longa et 
intima rerum angustarum domi experientia, aptissimum esse 
qui divitias tueatur, beneficenterque ac prudenter iis divinis 
creditis utatur, — ergo, motus hisce cogitationibus, exque 
amore meo in ilium magno, do, legoque nepoti caro meo 
supranominato omnes singularesque istas possessiones nee 
ponderabiles nee computabiles meas quse sequuntur, scilicet : 
quingentos libros quos mini pigneravit dictus Horn eras, anno 
lucis 1792, cum privilegio edendi et repetendi opus istud 
c scientificum ' (quod dicunt) suum, si sic elegerit. Tamen 
D. O. M. precor oculos Homeri nepotis mei ita aperiat eumque 
moveat, ut libros istos in bibliotheca unius e plurimis castellis 
suis Hispaniensibus tuto abscondat." 

His verbis (vix credibilibus) auditis, cor meum in pectore 
exsultavit. Deinde, quoniam tractatus Anglice scriptus spem 
auctoris fefellerat, quippe quum studium Historian Naturalis in 
Eepublica nostra inter factionis strepitum languescat, Latine 
versum edere statui, et eo potius quia nescio quomodo dis- 



NOTICES OF AN INDEPENDENT TRESS. xli 

ciplina academics ct duo diplomats proficiant, nisi quod peritos 
linguarum omniuo mortuarum (et danmaiidarum, ut dicebat 
iste -TTcivovpyos Gulielmus Cobbett) uos faciaut. 

Et mihi adhuc superstcs est tota ilia editio prima, quam 
quasi crcpitaculum per quod deutes cauiuos deutibam retineo. 



OPERIS SPECIMEN. 

{Ad cremplum Johanms Physiophili specimi/tis Monachologia.) 
12. S. B. M ilitaris, Wilbur. Carnifex, Jablonsk. Pro/anus, Desfokt. 

[Male hancce speciem Cyclopem Fabricius vocat, ut qui singulo oculo 
ad quod sui interest distinguitur. Melius vero Isaacus Outis uullum inter 
S. milit. S.que Belzebul (Fabric. 152) discriraen esse defendit.] 

Habitat civitat. Americ. austral. 

Aureis liueis splendidus; plerumque tamen sordidus, utpote lanienas 
valde frequentans, foetore sanguinis allectus. Amat quoque iusuper septa 
apricari, neque inde, nisi maxima conatioue, detruditur. Candidatus ergo 
populariter vocatus. Caput cristam quasi pennarum ostendit. Pro cibo 
vaccam publicam callide mulget ; abdomen enorme ; facultas suctus baud 
facile estimanda. Otiosus, fatuus ; ferox nihilominus, semperque dimicare 
paratus. Tortuose repit. 

Capite saepe maxima cum enra dissecto, ne illud rudimentum etiam 
cerebri commune omnibus prope insectis detegere poteram. 

Unara de hoc S. milit. rem singularem notavi ; nam S. Guineens. 
(Fabric. 14-3) servos facit, et idcirco a multis summa in reverentia habitus, 
quasi scintillas rationis paene humame demonstraus. 

24. S. B. Criticus, Wilbur. Zoilus, Fabric. Pyymaus, Carlsen. 

[Stultissime Johannes Stryx cum S. punctato (Fabric. 64 — 109) co»- 
fundit. Specimina quamplurima scrutationi microscopicae subjeci, nunquam 
tamen unum ulla indicia puncti cujusvis prorsus ostendentem inveni.] 

Prsecipue formidolosus, insectatusque, in proxima rima anonyma sese ab- 
scondit, toe, tee, creberrirae stridens. Ineptus, segnipes. 

Habitat ubiqne gentium ; in sicco ; nidum suum terebratione indefessa aedi- 
ficans. C'ibus. Libros depascit ; siccos praecipue seligens, et forte succidum 



THE BIGLOTT PAPERS. 



•& 



MELIBCEUS-HIPPOXA X. 



THE 



BIGLOW PAPERS, 



WITH AN INTRODUCTION, NOTES, GLOSSARY, 
AND COPIOUS INDEX, 



By HOMER WILBUR, A.M. 

PASTOR OF THE FIRST CHVHCH IN JAALAM, AND < PROSPECTIVE) MEMBER OF 
X»XT LITERARY, LEARNED, AND SCIENTIFIC -OCIETIES, 

for xchic/i see page xWn.) 



The ploughman's whistle, or the trivial flute, 
Find* more respect than great Apollo's lute. 

Qua rles's Emblems, z. n. e. <<. 

Margaritas, munde porcine, calcasti : en. siliquas accipe. 

Jae. Car. Fil. ad rub. Leg. 5 1. 



XOTE TO TITLE-PAGE. 



It will not have escaped the attentive eye, that I have, on 
the title-page, omitted those honorary appendages to the 
editorial name which not only add greatly to the value of 
every book, but whet and exacerbate the appetite of the 
reader. For not only does he surmise that an honorary 
membership of literary and scientific societies implies a certain 
amount of necessary distinction on the part of the recipient of 
such decorations, but he is willing to trust himself more 
entirely to an author who writes under the fearful responsi- 
bility of involving the reputation of such bodies as the S. 
Archaol. Baliom., or the Acad. Lit. et Sclent. Kamtschat. I 
cannot but think that the early editions of Shakspeare and 
Milton wo\dd have met with more rapid and general accept- 
ance, but for the barrenness of their respective title-pages; 
and I believe that, even now, a publisher of the works of 
either of those justly distinguished men would find his account 
in procuring their admission to the membership of learned 
bodies on the Continent, — a proceeding no whit more in- 
congruous than the reversal of the judgment against Socrates, 
when he was already more than twenty centuries beyond the 
reach of antidotes., and when his memory had acquired a deserved 
re-pectability. I conceive that it was a feeling of the import- 
ance of this precaution which induced Mr. Locke to style 
himself "Gent." on the title-page of his Essay, as who should 



xlviii NOTE TO TITLE-PAGE. 

say to his readers that they could receive his metaphysics on 
the honor of a gentleman. 

Nevertheless, finding, that, without descending to a smaller 
size of type than would have been compatible with the dignity 
of the several societies to be named, I could not compress my 
intended list within the limits of a single page, and thinking, 
moreover, that the act would carry with it an air of decorous 
modesty, I have chosen to take the reader aside, as it were, 
into my private closet, and there not only exhibit to him the 
diplomas which I already possess, but also to furnish him with 
a prophetic vision of those which I may, without undue pre- 
sumption, hope for, as not beyond the reach of human ambition 
and attainment. And I am the rather induced to this from the 
fact, that my name has been unaccountably dropped from the 
last triennial catalogue of our beloved Alma Mater. Whether 
this is to be attributed to the difficulty of Latinizing any of 
those honorary adjuncts (with a complete list of which I took 
care to furnish the proper persons nearly a year beforehand), 
or whether it had its origin in any more culpable motives, I 
forbear to consider in this place, the matter being in course of 
painful investigation. But, however this may be, I felt the 
omission the more keenly, as I had, in expectation of the new 
catalogue, enriched the library of the Jaalam Athenseuni with 
the old one then in my possession, by which means it has 
come about that my children will be deprived of a never- 
wearying winter-evening's amusement in looking out the name 
of their parent in that distinguished roll. Those harmless 

innocents had at least committed no but I forbear, having 

intrusted my reflections and animadversions on this painful 
topic to the safe-keeping of my private diary, intended for 
posthumous publication. I state this fact here, in order that 
certain nameless individuals, who are, perhaps, overmuch con- 
gratulating themselves upon my silence, may know that a 



NOTE TO TITLE-PAGE. xllX 

rod is in pickle which the vigorous hand of a justly in censed 
posterity will apply to their memories. 

The careful reader will note, that, in the list which I have 

cured, I have included the names of several Cisatlantic so- 

a to which a place is not commonly assigned in proces- 

- of this nature. I have ventured to do this, not only to 

encourage native ambition and genius, but also because I have 

never been able to perceive in what way distance (unless we 

suppose them at the end of a lever) could increase the weight 

iraed bodies. As far as I have been able to extend my 

relies among such stuffed specimens as occasionally reach 

America, I have discovered no generic difference between the 

antipodal Yogrvm Japonicum and the F. AmencanvM sufficient ly 

oommon in our own immediate neighbourhood. Yet, with a 

becoming deference to the popular belief, that distinctions of 

sort arc enhanced in value by every additional mile they 

1. I have intermixed the names of some tolerably distant 

literary and other associations with the rest. 

I add here, also, an advertisement, which, that it may be the 
more readily understood by those persons especially interested 
therein, I have written in that curtailed and otherwise mal- 
treated canine Latin, to the writing and reading of which they 
are accustomed. 

Omxib. per tot. Orb. Terrar. Catalog. Academ. Edd. 

Minim, gent, diplom. ab inclytiss. acad. vest, orans. vir. 
honorand. operosiss., at sol. ut sciat. quant, glor. nom. meum 
(dipl. fort, concess.) catal. vest. temp, futur. affer., ill. suDJec, 
addit. omnib. titul. honorar. qu. adh. non tant. opt. quam pro- 
bab. put. 



1 NOTE TO TITLE-PAGE. 

HOMERUS WILBUR, Mr, Episc. Jaalam. S. T. D. 1850, 
et Yal. 1849, et Neo-Cses. et Bran, et Gulielm. 1852, et Gul. 
et Mar. et Bowd. et Georgiop. et Yiridimont. et Columb. Nov. 
Ebor. 1853, et Amherst, et Watervill. et S. Jarlath. Hib. et S. 
Mar. et S. Joseph, et S. And. Scot. 1854, et Nashvill. et Dart, 
et Dickins. et Concord, et Wash, et Columbian, et Chariest, et 
Jeff, et Dubl. et Oxon. et Cantab, et cset. 1855, P. XL N. C. H. 
et J. U. D. Gott. et Osnab. et Heidelb. 1860, et Acad. Bore 
vs. Berolin. Soc. et SS. BR. Lugd. Bat. et Patav. et Lond. 
et Edinb. et Ins. Eeejee. et Null. Terr, et Pekin. Soc. Hon. et 
S. H. S. et S. P. A. et A. A. S. et S. Humb. Unw. et S. Omn. 
Her. Quarund. q. Aliar. Promov. Passamaquod. et H. P. C. et 
I. O. H. et A. A. $. et II. K. P. et #. B. K. et Peucin. et 
Erosoph. et Philadelph. et Erat. in Unit, et 2. T. et S. Ar- 
cheeolog. Athen. et Acad. Scient. et Lit. Panorm. et SS. R. H. 
Matrit. et Beeloochist. et Caffrar. et Caribb. et M. S. Reg. Paris, 
et S. Am. Antisew. Soc. Hon. et P. D. Gott. et LL.D. 1852, 
et D.C.L. et Mus. Doc. Oxon.. 1860, et M. M. S. S. et M.D. 
1854, et Med. Eac. Univ. Harv. Soc. et S. pro Convers. Polly- 
wog. Soc. Hon. et Higgl. Piggl. et LL.B. 1853, et S. pro 
Christianiz. Moschet. Soc, et SS. Ante-Diluv. ubiq. Gent. Soc. 
Hon. et Civit. Cleric. Jaalam. et S. pro Diffus. General. Tenebr. 
Secret. Corr. 



INTRODUCTION. 



When, more than three years ago, my talented young 
parishioner, Mr. Biglow, came to me and submitted to 
my animadversions the first of his poems which he 
intended to commit to the more hazardous trial of a 
city newspaper, it never so much as entered my 
imagination to conceive that his productions would 
ever be gathered into a fair volume, and ushered into 
the august presence of the reading public by myself. 
So little are we short sighted mortals able to predict 
the event ! I confess that there is to me a quite new 
-faction in being associated (though only as sleeping 
partner) in a book which can stand by itself in an 
independent unity on the shelves of libraries. For there 
is always this drawback from the pleasure of printing a 
sermon, that, whereas the queasy stomach of this gene- 
ration will not bear a discourse long enough to make 
a separate volume, those religious and godly-minded 
children (those Samuels, if I may call them so) of the 
brain must at first lie buried in an undistinguished 



lil INTRODUCTION. 

heap, and then get such resurrection as is vouchsafed 
to them, mummy-wrapt with a score of others in a 
cheap binding, with no other mark of distinction than 
the word " Miscellaneous " printed upon the back. Far 
be it from me to claim any credit for the quite unex- 
pected popularity which I am pleased to find these 
bucolic strains have attained unto. If I know myself, 
I am measurably free from the itch of vanity ; yet I 
may be allowed to say that I was not backward to 
recognize in them a certain wild, puckery, acidulous 
(sometimes even verging toward that point which, in 
our rustic phrase, is termed shut-eye) flavour, not wholly 
unpleasing, nor unwholesome, to palates cloyed with 
the sugariness of tamed and cultivated fruit. It may 
be, also, that some touches of my own, here and there, 
may have led to their wider acceptance, albeit solely 
from my larger experience of literature and author- 
ship. 1 

I was, at first, inclined to discourage Mr. Biglow's 
attempts, as knowing that the desire to poetize is one 
of the diseases naturally incident to adolescence, which, 
if the fitting remedies be not at once and with a bold 
hand applied, may become chronic, and render one, 

The reader curious in such, matters may refer (if he can find them) 
to " A Sermon preached on the Anniversary of the Dark Day," " An 
Artillery Election Sermon," "A Discourse on the Late Eclipse," "Dorcas, 
a Euneral Sermon on the Death of Madam Suhmit Tidd, Relict of the late 
Experience Tidd, Esq." &c. &c. 



INTRODUCTION. liii 

who might else have become in due time an ornament 
of the social circle, a painful object even to nearest 
friends and relatives. But thinking, on a further 
experience, that there was a germ of promise in him 
which required only culture and the pulling up of 
weeds from around it, I thought it best to set before 
him the ackuowledged examples of English composi- 
tions in verse, and leave the rest to natural emula- 
tion. With this view, I accordingly lent him some 
volumes of Pope and Goldsmith, to the assiduous study 
of which he promised to devote his evenings. Not 
long afterwards he brought me some verses written 
upon that model, a specimen of which I subjoin, having 
chauged some phrases of less elegancy, and a few 
rhymes objectionable to the cultivated ear. The poem 
consisted of childish reminiscences, and the sketches 
which follow will not seem destitute of truth to those 
whose fortunate education began in a country village. 
And, first, let us hang up his charcoal portrait of the 
school-dame. 



Propt on the marsh, a dwelling now, I see 
The humble school-house of my A, B, C, 
Where well-drilled urchins, each behind his tire, 
Waited in ranks the wished command to fire ; 
Then all together, when the signal came, 
Discharged their a-b abs against the dame, 



liv INTRODUCTION. 

Who, 'mid the volleyed learning, firm and calm, 

Patted the furloughed ferule on her palm, 

And, to our wonder, could detect at once, 

Who flashed the pan, and who was downright dunce. 

There young Devotion learned to climb with ease 
The gnarly limbs of Scripture family-trees, 
And he was most commended and admired 
Who soonest to the topmost twig perspired ; 
Each name was called as many various ways 
As pleased the reader's ear on different days, 
So that the weather, or the ferule's stings, 
Colds in the head, or fifty other things, 
Transformed the helpless Hebrew thrice a week 
To guttural Pequot or resounding Greek, 
The vibrant accent skipping here and there, 
Just as it pleased invention or despair ; 
No controversial Hebraist was the Dame ; 
With or without the points pleased her the same ; 
If any tyro found a name too tough, 
And looked at her, pride furnished skill enough ; 
She nerved her larynx for the desperate thing, 
And cleared the five-barred syllables at a spring. 

Ah, dear old times ! there once it was my hap, 
Perched on a stool, to wear the long-eared cap ; 
From books degraded, there I sat at ease, 
A drone, the envy of compulsory bees." 

I add only one further extract, which will possess 
a melancholy interest to all such as have endeavoured 
to glean the materials of Revolutionary history from 



INTRODUCTION. lv 

the lips of aged persons, who took a part in the actual 
making of it, and. finding the manufacture profitable, 
continued the supply in an adequate proportion to the 
demand. 

" Old Joe is gone, who saw hot Percy goad 
His slow artillery up the Concord road, 
A talc which grew in wonder, year by year, 
As, every time he told it, Joe drew near 
To the main fight, till, faded and grown gray, 
The original scene to bolder tints gave way ; 
Then Joe had heard the foe's scared double-quick 
Beal on stove drum with one uucaptured stick, 
And, ere death came the lengthening tale to lop, 
Himself had fired, and seen a red-coat drop ; 
Had Joe lived long enough, that scrambling fight 
Had squared more nearly to his sense of right, 
And vanquished Percy, to complete the tale, 
Had hammered stone for life in Concord jail." 

I do not know that the foregoing extracts ought not 
to be called my own rather than Mr. Biglow's, as, 
indeed, he maintained stoutly that my file had left 
nothing of his in them. I should not, perhaps, have 
felt entitled to take so great liberties with them, had I 
not more than suspected an hereditary vein of poetry 
in myself, a very near ancestor having written a Latin 
poem in the Harvard Gratidatio on the accession of 
the Third. Suffice it to say, that, whether not 
>ati.-fied with such limited approbation as I couid 



lvi INTRODUCTION. . 

conscientiously bestow, or from a sense of natural 
inaptitude, I know not, certain it is that my young- 
friend could never be induced to any further essays in 
this kind. He affirmed that it was to him like writing 
in a foreign tongue, — that Mr. Pope's versification was 
like the regular ticking of one of Willard's clocks, in 
which one could fancy, after long listening, a certain 
kind of rhythm or tune, but which yet was only a 
poverty-stricken tick, tick after all, — and that he had 
never seen a sweet- water on a trellis growing so fairly, 
or in forms so pleasing to his eye, as a fox- grape over 
a scrub-oak in a swamp. He added I know not what, 
to the effect that the sweet- water would only be the 
more disfigured by having its leaves starched and 
ironed out, and that Pegasus (so he called him) hardly 
looked right with his mane and tail in curl-papers. 
These and other such opinions I did not long strive 
to eradicate, attributing them rather to a defective 
education and senses untuned by too long familiarity 
with purely natural objects, than to a perverted moral 
sense. I was the more inclined to this leniency since 
sufficient evidence was not to seek, that his verses, as 
wanting as they certainly were in classic polish and 
point, had somehow taken hold of the public ear in a 
surprising manner. So, only setting him right as to 
the quantity of the proper name Pegasus, I left him 
to follow the bent of his natural genius. 



INTRODUCTION. lvil 

There are two things upon which it would seem 
fitting to dilate somewhat more largely in this place, — 
the Yankee character and the Yankee dialect. And, 
first, of the Yankee character, which has wanted neither 
open maligners, nor even more dangerous enemies in 
the persons of those unskilful painters who have given 
to it that hardness, angularity, and want of proper 
perspective, which, in truth, belonged, not to their 
subject, but to their own niggard and unskilful 
pencil. 

New England was not so much the colony of a 
mother country, as a Hagar driven forth into the 
wilderness. The little self-exiled band which came 
hither in 1620 came, not to seek gold, but to found 
a democrac}-. They came that they might have the 
privilege to work and pray, to sit upon hard benches 
and listen to painful preachers as long as they would, 
yea, even unto thirty- seventhly, if the spirit so willed 
it. And surely, if the Greek might boast his Thermo- 
pylae, where three hundred men fell in resisting the 
Persian, we may well be proud of our Plymouth Rock, 
where a handful of men, women, and children not 
merely faced, but vanquished, winter, famine, the wilder- 
ness, and the yet more invincible storge that drew them 
back to the green island far away. These found no 
lotus growing upon the surly shore, the taste of which 
could make them forget their little native Ithaca ; nor 



lviii INTRODUCTION. 

were they so wanting to themselves in faith as to burn 
their ship, but could see the fair west wind belly the 
homeward sail, and then turn unrepining to grapple 
with the terrible Unknown. 

As Want was the prime foe these hardy exodists 
had to fortress themselves against, so it is little wonder 
if that traditional feud is long in wearing out of the 
stock. The wounds of the old warfare were long aheal- 
ing, and an east wind of hard times puts a new ache 
in every one of them. Thrift was the first lesson in 
their horn-book, pointed out, letter after letter, by the 
lean finger of the hard schoolmaster, Necessity. Neither 
were those plump, rosy-gilled Englishmen that came 
hither, but a hard-faced, atrabilious, earnest-eyed race, 
stiff from long wrestling with the Lord in prayer, and 
who had taught Satan to dread the new Puritan hug. 
Add two hundred years' influence of soil, climate, and 
exposure, with its necessary result of idiosyncrasies, 
and we have the present Yankee, full of expedients, 
half-master of all trades, inventive in all but the beau- 
tiful, full of shifts, not yet capable of comfort, armed 
at all points against the old enemy Hunger, longani- 
mous, good at patching, not so careful for what is best 
as for what will do, with a clasp to his purse and a 
button to his pocket, not skilled to build against Time, 
as in old countries, but against sore-pressing Need, 
accustomed to move the world with no irov otw but 



INTRODUCTION. lix 

his own two feet, and no lever but his own long fore- 
east. A strange hybrid, indeed, did circumstance beget, 
here in the New World, upon the old Puritan stock, 
and the earth never before saw such mystic-practicalism, 
such niggard -geniality, such calculating - fanaticism, 
such cast-iron-enthusiasm, such unwilling humour, such 
close -fisted -generosity. This new Grceculus esuriens 
will make a living out of any thing. He will invent 
new trades as well as tools. His brain is his capital, 
and he will get education at all risks. Put him on 
.Tuan Fernandez, and he would make a spelling-book 
first, and a salt-pan afterwards. In cwlum, jusseris, 
. — or the other way either, — it is all one, so any 
thing is to be got by it. Yet, after all. thin, speculative 
Jonathan is more like the Englishman of two centuries 
ago than John Bull himself is. He has lost somewhat 
in solidity, has become fluent and adaptable, but more 
of the original groundwork of character remains. He 
feels more at home with Fulke Greville, Herbert of 
( 'herbury, Quarles, George Herbert, and Browne, than 
with his modern English cousins. He is nearer than 
John, by at least a hundred years, to Naseby, Marston 
Moor, Worcester, and the time w T hen, if ever, there 
were true Englishmen. John Bull has suffered the 
idea of the Invisible to be very much flattened out of 
him. Jonathan is conscious still that he lives in the 



INTRODUCTION. 



world of the Unseen as well as of the Seen. To move 
John, you must make your fulcrum of solid beef and 
pudding j an abstract idea will do for Jonathan. 



%• TO THE INDULGENT READER. 

My friend, the Rev. Mr. Wilbur, having been seized with a 
dangerous fit of illness, before this Introduction had passed 
through the press, and being incapacitated for all literary ex- 
ertion, sent to me his notes, memoranda, &c, and requested 
me to fashion them into some shape more fitting for the gene- 
ral eye. This, owing to the fragmentary and disjointed state 
of his manuscripts, I have felt wholly unable to do ; yet, being 
unwilling that the reader should be deprived of such parts of 
his lucubrations as seemed more finished, and not well discern- 
ing how to segregate these from the rest, I have concluded to 
send them all to the press precisely as they are. 

Columbus Nte, 'Pastor of a Church in Bungtown Corner. 



INTRODUCTION. lxi 



Tt remains to speak of the Yankee dialect. And, 
first, it may be premised, in a general way, that any 
one much read in the writings of the early colonists 
need not be told that the far greater share of the words 
and phrases now esteemed peculiar to New England, 
and local there, were brought from the mother-country. 
A person familiar with the dialect of certain portions 
of Massachusetts will not fail to recognize, in ordinan- 
di see urse, many words now noted in English vocabula- 
ries as archaic, the greater part of which were in com- 
mon use about the time of the King James translation 
of the Bible. Shakspeare stands less in need of a glos- 
. to most New Euglanders than to many a native of 
the Old Country. The peculiarities of our speech, 
however, are rapidly wearing out. As there is no 
country where reading is so universal and newspapers 
are so multitudinous, so no phrase remains long local, 
but is transplanted in the mail-bags to every remotest 
corner of the land. Consequently our dialect approaches 
nearer to uniformity than that of any other nation. 

The English have complained of us for coining new 

Is. Many of those so stigmatized were old ones 

by them forgotten, and all make now an unquestioned 

part of the currency, wherever Englisdi is spoken. 

Undoubtedly, we have a right to make new words, as 



lxii INTRODUCTION. 

they are needed by the fresh aspects under which life 
presents itself here in the New World ; and, indeed, 
wherever a language is alive, it grows. It might be 
questioned whether we could not establish a stronger 
title to the ownership of the English tongue than the 
mother-islanders themselves. Here, past all question, 
is to be its great home and centre. And not only is it 
already spoken here by greater numbers, but with a far 
higher popular average of correctness, than in Britain. 
The great writers of it, too, we might claim as ours, 
were ownership to be settled by the number of readers 
and lovers. 

As regards the provincialisms to be met with in this 
volume, I may say that the reader will not find one 
which is not (as I believe) either native or imported 
with the early settlers, nor one which I have not, with 
my own ears, heard in familiar use. In the metrical 
portion of the book, I have endeavoured to adapt the 
spelling as nearly as possible to the ordinary mode of 
pronunciation. Let the reader who deems me over- 
particular remember this caution of Martial : — 

" Quern recitas, meus est, Fidentine, libellus ; 
Sed male cum recitas, incipit esse tuus." 

A few further explanatory remarks will not be imper- 
tinent. 

I shall barely lay down a few general rules for the 
reader's guidance. 



INTRODUCTION. lxiii 

1. The genuine Yankee never gives the rough sound 
to the r when he can help it, and often displays con- 
siderable ingenuity in avoiding it even before a vowel. 
!e seldom sounds the final g t a piece of self- 
denial, if we consider his partiality for nasals. The 
same of the final d, as hari and stari for hand and 

3. The h in such words as while, u'hen,tvhere, he omits 
altogether. 

4. In regard to a, he shows some inconsistency, 
sometimes giving a close and obscure sound, as hev for 

dy for h vndy, a for as, thet for that, and again 
giving it the broad sound it has 'm father, as hdasome 

5. To the sound on he prefixes an e (hard to exem- 
plify otherwise than orally). 

The following passage in Sliakspeare he would recite 
thus : — 



»w is the winta uv eour discontent 
M< d glorious summa by this sun o' Yock, 

11 the cleouds thet leowered upun eour heouse 
In the deep buzzura o' the oshin buried ; 
Neow air eour breows beound 'ith victorious wreaths ; 
Eour breused arms hung up fer monhnunce ; 
Eour starn alarums changed to merry meetins, 
Eour dreffle marches to delightful measures. 
Grim-Yisaged war heth smeuthed his wrinkled front, 



lxiv INTRODUCTION. 

An' neow, instid o' mountin' barebid steeds 
To fright the souls o' ferfle edverseries, 
He capers nhnly in a lady's chamber, 
To the lascivious pleasin' uv a loot." 

6. Au, in such words as daughter and slaughter, he 
pronounces ah. 

7. To the dish thus seasoned add a drawl ad libitum. 

[Mr. Wilbur's notes here become entirely fragmentary. — C. N.] 

a. Unable to procure a likeness of Mr. Biglow, I 
thought the curious reader might be gratified with a 
sight of the editorial effigies. And here a choice be- 
tween two was offered, — the one a profile (entirely 
black) cut by Doyle, the other a portrait painted by a 
native artist of much promise. The first of these 
seemed wanting in expression, and in the second a 
slight obliquity of the visual organs has been heightened 
(perhaps from an over-desire of force on the part of the 
artist) into too close an approach to actual strabismus. 
This slight divergence in nay optical apparatus from the 
ordinary model — however I may have been taught to 
regard it in the light of a mercy rather than a cross, 
since it enabled me to give as much of directness and 
personal application to my discourses as met the wants 
of my congregation, without risk of offending any by 
being supposed to have him or her in my eye (as the 
saying is) — seemed yet to Mrs. Wilbur a sufficient ob- 



INTRODUCTION. lxv 

jection to the engraving of the aforesaid painting. We 

read of many who either absolutely refused to allow the 

copying of their features, as especially did Plotinus and 

Bila.ua among the ancients, not to mention the more 

modern instances of Scioppius Palseottus, Pinellus, 

Velserus, Gataker, and others, or were indifferent 

thereto, as Cromwell. 

/?. Yet was Caesar desirous ot concealing his baldness. 

my Lord Protector's carefulness in the 

matter of his wart might be cited. Men generally 

more desirous of being improved in their portraits than 

Shall probably find very unflattered like- 

- of ourselves in Recording Angel's gallery. 



y. Whether any of our national peculiarities may be 
traced to our use of stoves, as a certain closeness of the 
lips in pronunciation, and a smothered smoulderingness 
Imposition, seldom roused to open flame? An un- 
restrained intercourse with fire probably conducive to 
generosity and hospitality of soul. Ancient Mexicans 
used stoves, as the friar Augustin Ptuiz reports, Hakluvt, 
III., AGS, — but Popish priests not always reliable 
authority. 

To-day picked my Isabella grapes. Crop injured by 
attacks of rose-bug in the spring. Whether Xoah was 
justifiable in preserving this class of insects ? 



lxvi INTRODUCTION. 

8. Concerning Mr. Biglow's pedigree. Tolerably cer- 
tain that there was never a poet among his ancestors. 
An ordination hymn attributed to a maternal uncle, 
but perhaps a sort of production not demanding the 
creative faculty. 

His grandfather a painter of the grandiose or Michael 
Angelo school. Seldom painted objects smaller than 
houses or barns, and these with uncommon expression. 



c. Of the Wilburs no complete pedigree. The crest 
said to be a wild boar, whence, perhaps, the name. (?) 
A connection with the Earls of Wilbraham {quasi wild 
boar ham) might be made out. This suggestion worth 

following up. In 1677, John W. m. Expect , had 

issue, 1. John, 2. Haggai, 3. Expect, 4. Ruhamah, 
5. Desire. 

" Hear lyes y e bodye of Mrs Expect Wilber, 
Y e crewell salvages they kil'd her 
Together w th other Christian soles eleaven, 
October y e ix daye, 1707. 
Y e stream of Jordan sh' as crost ore 
And now expeacts me on y e other shore : 
I live in hope her soon to join ; 
Her earthlye yeeres were forty and nine." 

From Gravestone in Pekussett, North Parish. 

This is unquestionably the same John who afterward 
(1711) married Tabitha Hagg or Rag. 

But if this were the case, she seems to have died 



INTRODUCTION. lxvii 

early ; for only three years after, namely, 1714, we 
have evidence that he married Winifred, daughter of 
Lieutenant Tipping. 

He seems to have been a man of substance, for we 
find him in 1696 conveying "one undivided eightieth 
part of a salt-meadow " in Yabbok, and he commanded 
a sloop in 1702. 

Those who doubt the importance of genealogical 
studies tusfe potius quam argumento erudiendi. 

I trace him as far as 1723, and there lose him. In 
that year he was chosen selectman. 

No gravestone. Perhaps overthrown when new 
hearse-house was built, 1802. 

He was probably the son of John, who came from 
Bilham Comit. Salop, circa 1642. 

This first John was a man of considerable importance, 
being twice mentioned with the honourable prefix of 
Mr, in the town records. Name spelt with two l-s. 

" Hear lyeth y e bod [stone unhappily broJcen.~] 
Mr. Dion Willber [Esq.] [I inclose this in brackets as 

doubtful. To me^it seems clear, .] 
OVt die {illegible ; looks like xviii.~] . . . iii [prob. 1693.] 

paynt 

deseased seinte : 

A friend and [fath]er untoe all y e opreast, 
Hee gave y e wicked familists noe reast, 
When Sat "an bl]ewe his Antinomian blaste, 
Woe clong to [Willber as a steadf ]ast maste. 
- -iynst y e horrid Qna[kers] 



lxviii INTRODUCTION. 

It is greatly to be lamented that this curious epitaph 
is mutilated. It is said that the sacrilegious British 
soldiers made a target of this stone during the war of 
Independence. How odious an animosity which pauses 
not at the grave ! How brutal that which spares not 
the monuments of authentic history ! This is not im- 
probably from the pen of Rev. Moddy Pyram, who is 
mentioned by Hubbard as having been noted for a 
silver vein of poetry. If his papers be still extant, a 
copy might possibly be recovered. 



THE BIGLOW PAPEKS. 



No. I. 
A LETTER 



FROM MR. EZEKIEL BIGLOW OF JAALAM TO THE HON. JOSEPH 
T. BUCKINGHAM, EDITOR OF THE BOSTON COURIER, IN- 
CLOSING A POEM OF HIS SON, MR. HOSE A BIGLOW. 

Jaylem, june 1846. 

Mister Eddyter : — Our Hosea wuz down to Boston 
last week, and he see a cruetin Sarjunt a struttin 
round as popler as a hen with 1 chicking, with 2 
fellers a druinmin and fifin arter him like all nater. 
the sarjunt he thout Hosea hedn't gut his i teeth cut 
cos he looked a kindo's though he'd jest com down, so 
he cal'lated to hook him in, but Hosy woodn't take 
none o' his sarse for all he hed much as 20 Rooster's 
tales stuck onto his hat and eenamost enuf brass a 
bobbin up and down on his shoulders and figureed 
onto his coat and trousis, let alone wut nater hed sot 
in his featers, to make a 6 pounder out on. 



/' 



2 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

wal, Hosea he com home considerabal riled, and 
arter I 'd gone to bed I heern Him a thrashin round 
like a short-tailed Bull in fii-time. The old Woman 
ses she to me ses she, Zekle, ses she, our Hosee's gut 
the chollery or suthin anuther ses she, don't you Bee 
skeered, ses I, he's oney amakin pottery 1 ses i, he's 
oilers on hand at that ere busynes like Da & martin, 
and shure enuf, cum mornin, Hosy he cum down stares 
full chizzle, hare on eend and cote tales flyin, and sot 
rite of to go reed his varses to Parson Wilbur bein 
he haint aney grate shows o' book larnin himself, 
bimeby he cum back and sed the parson wuz dreffle 
tickled with 'em as i hoop you will Be, and said they 
wuz True grit. 

Hosea ses taint hardly fair to call 'em hisn now, 
cos the parson kind o' slicked off sum o' the last varses, 
but he told Hosee he didn't want to put his ore in to 
tetch to the Rest on 'em, bein they wuz verry well 
As thay wuz, and then Hosy ses he sed suthin a nuther 
about Simplex Mundishes or sum sech feller, but I 
guess Hosea kind o' didn't hear him, for I never hearn 
o' nobody o' that name in this villadge, and I've lived 
here man and boy 76 year cum next tater diggin, and 
thair aint no wheres a kitting spryer 'n I be. 

If you print 'em I wish you'd jest let folks know 

1 Jut insanit, aut versus facit. — H. W. 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 3 

who hosy's father is, cos my ant Keziah used to say it's 
uater to be curus ses she, she aint livin though and 
likely kind o' lad. 

EZEKIEL BIGLOW. 



Thrash away, you '11 hev to rattle 

On them kittle drums o' yourn, — 
"Taint a knowin' kind o' cattle 

Thet is ketched with mouldy corn : 
Put in stiff, you fifer feller, 

Let folks see how spry you be, — 
Guess you '11 toot till you are yeller 

'Fore you git ahold o' me ! 

Thet air flag 's a leetle rotten, 

Hope it aint your Sunday's best ; — 
Fact ! it takes a sight o' cotton 

To stuff out a soger's chest : 
Sence we farmers hev to pay fer 't, 

Ef you must wear humps like these, 
Sposin' you should try salt hay fer 't, 

It would du ez slick ez grease. 
b2 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

'T would n't suit them Southern fellers, 

They 're a dreffle graspin' set, 
We must oilers blow the bellers 

Wen they want their irons het ; 
May be it 's all right ez preachin', 

But my narves it kind o' grates, 
Wen I see the overreachin' 

0' them nigger-drivin' States. 

Them thet rule us, them slave-traders, 

Haint they cut a thunderin' swarth 
(Helped by Yankee renegaders), 

Thru the vartu o' the North ! 
We begin to think it 's nater 

To take sarse an' not be riled ; — 
Who 'd expect to see a tater 

All on eend at bein' biled? 



Ez fer war, I call it murder, — 

There you hev it plain an' flat ; 
I don't want to go no furder 

Than my Testyment fer that ; 
God hez sed so plump an' fairly, 

It 's ez long ez it is broad, 
An' you 've gut to git up airly 

Ef you want to take in God. 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

Taint your eppyletts an' feathers 

Make the thing a grain more right 
Taint afollerin' your bell-wethers 

Will excuse ye in His sight ; 
Ef you take a sword an' dror it, 

An' go stick a feller thru, 
Guv'ment aint to answer for it, 

God '11 send the bill to you. 

Wut 's the use o' meetin-goin' 

Every Sabbath, wet or dry, 
Ef it 's right to go amowin 1 

Feller-men like oats an' rye ? 
I dunno but wut it's pooty 

Trainin' round in bobtail coats, — 
But it 's curus Christian dooty 

This ere cuttin' folks's throats. 



They may talk o' Freedom's airy 

Tell they 're pupple in the face,- 
It 's a grand gret cemetary 

Fer the barthrights of our race 
They jest want this Californy 

So's to lug new slave- states in 
To abuse ye, an' to scorn ye, 

An' to plunder ye like sin. 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

Aint it cute to see a Yankee 

Take sech everlastin' pains 
All to git the Devil's thankee, 

Helpin' on 'em weld their chains 1 
Wy, it 's jest ez clear ez figgers, 

Clear ez one an' one make two, 
Chaps thet make black slaves o' niggers 

Want to make wite slaves o' you. 

Tell ye jest the eend I've come to 

Arter cipherin' plaguy smart, 
An' it makes a handy sum, tu, 

Any gump could larn by heart ; 
Laborin' man an' laborin' woman 

Hev one glory an' one shame, 
Ev'y thin' thet 's done inhuman 

Injers all on 'em the same. 

'Taint by turnin' out to hack folks 

You 're agoin' to git your right, 
Nor by lookin' down on black folks 

Coz you 're put upon by wite ; 
Slavery aint o' nary colour, 

'Taint the hide thet makes it wus, 
All it keers fer in a feller 

'S jest to make him fill its pus. 



THE BIGLOW PAIM 

Want to tackle me in, du ye ? 

I expect you '11 hev to wait; 
Won cold lead puts daylight thru ye 

all begin to kal'late ; 
'Spose the crows wun't fall to pickin' 
All the carkiss from yonr bones, 

on helped to give a lickin' 
To them poor half-Spanish drones ? 



Jest 2:0 home an 1 ask our N 



ancy 



Wether I'd be sech a goose 
Ez to jine ye, — guess you'd fancy 

The eternal bung wuz loose ! 
She wants me fer home consumption, 

Let alone the hay's to mow, — 
Ef you 're arter folks o' gumption, 

You've a darned long: row to hoe. 



Take them editors thet 's crowin' 

Like a cockerel three months old, — 
Don't ketch any on 'em goin', 

Though they be so blasted bold ; 
Aint they a prime set o' fellers? 

Tore they think on't they will sprout 
(Like a peach thet's got the yellers), 

With the meanness bustin' out. 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

Wal, go 'long to help 'em stealin' 

Bigger pens to cram with slaves, 
Help the men thet 's oilers dealin' 

Insults on your fathers' graves ; 
Help the strong to grind the feeble, 

Help the many agin the few, 
Help the men thet call your people 

Wite washed slaves an' peddlin' crew ! 

Massachusetts, God forgive her, 

She's akneelin' with the rest, 
She, thet ough' to ha' clung fer ever 

In her grand old eagle-nest ; 
She thet ough' to stand so fearless 

Wile the wracks are round her hurled, 
Holdin' up a beacon peerless 

To the oppressed of all the world ! 

Haint they sold your coloured seamen 1 

Haint they made your env'ys wiz ? 
Wut '11 make ye act like freemen 1 

Wut '11 git your dander riz 1 
Come, I'll tell ye wut I 'm thinkin' 

Is our dooty in this fix, 
They 'd ha' done 't ez quick ez winkin' 

In the days o' seventy-six. 



THE BIGLOW PAPBB& 

Clang the bells in every steeple, 

Call all true men to disown 
The tradoooers of our people, 

The enslavers o' their own ; 
Let our dear old Bay State proudly 

Put the trumpet to her mouth, 
Let her ring this messidge loudly 

In the ears of all the South : — 



" I '11 return ye good fer evil 

Much ez we frail mortals can, 
Hut I wun't go help the Devil 

Makiir mau the cus o' man ; 
Call me coward, call me traitor. 

Jest ez suits your mean idees, — 
Here I stand a tyrant-hater, 

An* the friend o' God an Peace ! " 



Ef I'd my way I hed ruther 

We should go to work an' part, — 
They take one way, we take t'other, — 

Guess it would n't break my heart ; 
Men hed ough' to put asunder 

Them thet God has noways jined ; 
An' I should n't gretly wonder 

Ef there 's thousands o' my mind. 



10 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

[The first recruiting sergeant on record I conceive to have 
been that individual who is mentioned in the Book of Job as 
going to and fro in tlie earth, and walking up and down in it. 
Bishop Latimer will have him to have been a bishop, but to 
me that other calling would appear more congenial. The sect 
of Cainites is not yet extinct, who esteemed the first-born of 
Adam to be the most worthy, not only because of that privilege 
of primogeniture, but inasmuch as he was able to overcome 
and slay his younger brother. That was a wise saying of the 
famous Marquis Pescara to the Papal Legate, that it was im- 
possible for men to serve Mars and Christ at the same time. 
Yet in time past the profession of arms was judged to be kclt 
*£°Xn v that °^ a gentleman, nor does this opinion want for 
strenuous upholders even in our day. Must we suppose, then, 
that the profession of Christianity was only intended for losels, 
or, at best, to afford an opening for plebeian ambition ? Or 
shall we hold with that nicely metaphysical Pomeranian, 
Captain Vratz, who was Count Konigsmark's chief instrument 
in the murder of Mr. Thynne, that the scheme of salvation 
has been arranged with an especial eye to the necessities of the 
upper classes, and that " God would consider a gentleman, and 
deal with him suitably to the condition and profession he had 
placed him in " ? It may be said of us all, Exemplo ph 
ratione vivimus. — H. W.] 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 11 



No. II. 
A LETTER 

FROM MR. HOSE A BIGLOW TO TTIE HON. J. T. BUCKINGHAM, 
EDITOR OF THE BOSTON COURIER, COVERING A LETTER FROM 
MR. B. SAWIN, FRIVATE IN THE MASSACHUSETTS REGIMENT. 

[This letter of Mr. Sawin's was not originally written in 
verse. Mr. Biglow, thinking it peculiarly susceptible of 
metrical adornment, translated it, so to speak, into his own 
vernacular tongue. This is not the time to consider the 
question, whether rhyme be a mode of expression natural to 
the human race. If leisure from other and more important 
avocations be granted, I will handle the matter more at large 
in an appendix to the present volume. In this place I will 
barely remark, that I have sometimes noticed in the un- 
languaged prattlings of infants a fondness for alliteration, 
assonance, and even rhyme, in which natural predisposition we 
may trace the three degrees through which our Anglo-Saxon 
verse rose to its culmination in the poetry of Pope. I would 
not be understood as questioning in these remarks that pious 
theory which supposes that children, if left entirely to them- 
selves, would naturally discourse in Hebrew. For this the 
authority of one experiment is claimed, and I could, with Sir 
Thomas Browne, desire its establishment, inasmuch as the 
acquirement of that sacred tongue would thereby be facilitated. 
I am aware that Herodotus states the conclusion of Psam- 
miticus to have been in favour of a dialect of the Phrygian. 



12 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

But, beside the chance that a trial of this importance would 
hardly be blessed to a Pagan monarch whose only motive was 
curiosity, we have on the Hebrew side the comparatively 
recent investigation of James the Pourth of Scotland. I will 
add to this prefatory remark, that Mr. Sawin, though a native 
of Jaalam, has never been a stated attendant on the religious 
exercises of my congregation. I consider my humble efforts 
prospered in that not one of my sheep hath ever indued the 
wolf's clothing of war, save for the comparatively innocent 
diversion of a militia training. Not that my flock are back- 
ward to undergo the hardships of defensive warfare. They serve 
cheerfully in the great army which fights even unto death pro 
arts et focis, accoutred with the spade, the axe, the plane, the 
sledge, the spelling-book, and other such effectual weapons 
against want and ignorance and unthrift. I have taught them 
(under God) to esteem our human institutions as but tents of 
a night, to be stricken whenever Truth puts the bugle to her 
lips, and sounds a march to the heights of wider- viewed intelli- 
gence and more perfect organization. — H. W.] 



Mister Buckinum, the follerin Billet was writ hum 
by a Yung feller of our town that wuz cussed fool 
enuff to goe atrottin inter Miss ChifF arter a Drum 
and fife, it ain't Nater for a feller to let on that he's 
sick o' any bizness that He went intu off his own free 
will and a Cord, but I rather cal'late he's middlin tired 
o' Voluntearin By this Time. I bleeve u may put de- 
pendunts on his statemence. For I never heered nothin 
bad on hira let Alone his havin what Parson Wilbur 
calls a pongshong for cocktales, and he ses it wuz a 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 13 

soshiashun of idees sot him agoin arter the Crootin 
Sargient cos he wore a cocktale onto his hat. 

his Folks giu the letter to me and i shew it to parson 
Wilbur and he ses it oughter Bee printed, send It to 
roister Buckinum, ses he, i don't oilers agree with him, 
sos he, but by Time, 1 ses he, I dv like a feller that ain't 
;i Feared. 

I have intusspussed a Few refleckshuns hear and 
thair. We're kind o' prest with Hayin. 

Ewers respecfly, 

HOSEA BIGLOW. 



This kind o' sogerin' aint a mite like our October 

train in', 
A chap could clear right out from there ef 't only 

looked like rainin'. 
An' th* Cunnles, tu, could kiver up their shappoes with 

bandanners, 

1 In relation to this expression, T cannot but think that Mr.Biglow has 
been too hasty in attributing it to me. Though Time be a comparatively 
innocent personage to swear by, and though Longinus in his discourse 
rwpi "Y*ow has commended timely oaths as not only a useful but sublime 
of speech, yet I have always kept my lips free from that abomina- 
tion. Odi profanum tuljtis, I hate your swearing and hectoring fellows. 
— H. W. 



14 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

An' send the insines skootin' to the bar-room with their 

banners 
(Fear o' gittin' on 'em spotted), an 5 a feller could cry 

quarter 
Ef he fired away his ramrod arter tu much rum an' 

water. 

Recollect wut fun we hed, you 'n I an' Ezry Hollis, 
Up there to Waltham plain last fall, ahavin' the 

Cornwallis 1 x 
This sort o' thing aint jest like thet, — I wish thet I wuz 

furder, — 2 
Nimepunce a day fer killin' folks comes kind o' low fer 

murder 
(Wy I've worked out to slarterin' some fer Deacon 

Cephas Billins, 
An' in the hardest times there wuz I oilers tetched ten 

shillins), 
There's sutthin' gits into my throat thet makes it hard 

to swaller, 
It comes so nateral to think about a hempen collar ; 
It 's glory, — but, in spite o' all my tryin' to git callous, 
I feel a kind o' in a cart, aridin' to the gallus. 
But wen it comes to' beirf killed, — I tell ye I felt 

streaked 



1 i hait the Site of a feller with a muskit as I du pizn But their is fun 
to a cornwallis I aint agoin' to deny it. — H. B. 

2 he means Not quite so fur i guess. — H. B. 



THE BIGLOW PAH 15 

The fust time ever I found out wy baggonets wuz 

peaked ; 
Here's how it wuz : I started out to go to a fandango, 
The sentinul he upa an' sez, " Thet 's furder 'an you 

can go." 
"None o' your sarse," sez I; sez he, " Stan' back ! " 

" Aint you a buster 1 " 
Sez I, '• I "m up to all thet air, I guess I Ve ben to 

muster ; 
I know wy sentinuls air sot : you aint agoin' to 

eat us ; 
Caleb haint no monopoly to court the seenoreetas ; 
My folks to hum air full ez good ez hisn be, by 

golly:" 

An" so ez I wuz goin' by, not thinkin' wut would folly, 
The everlastin' cus he stuck his one-pronged pitchfork 

in me 
An' made a hole right thru my close ez ef I wuz an 

inmy. 
Wal, it beats all how big I felt hoorawin' in ole 

Funnel 
Wen Mister Bolles he gin the sword to our Leftenant 

Cunnle 
(It 'a Mister Secondary Bolles, 1 thet writ the prize 

peace essay ; 

1 the igiierant creeter means Sekketary ; but he oilers stuck to his 
books like cobbler's was to an ile-stone. — H. B. 



16 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

Thet's wy he did n't list himself along o' us, I 



An' Rantoul, tu, talked pooty loud, but don't put his 

foot in it, 
Coz human life 's so sacred thet he 's principled agin' 

it — 
Though I myself can 't rightly see it 's any wus 

achokin' on 'em 
Than puttin' bullets thru their lights, or with a bagnet 

pokin' on 'em ; 
How dreffle slick he reeled it off (like Blitz at our 

lyceum 
Ahaulin' ribbins from his chops so quick you skeercely 

see 'em), 
About the Anglo-Saxon race (an' saxons would be 

handy 
To du the buryin' down here upon the Rio Grandy), 
About our patriotic pas an' our star-spangled banner, 
Our country's bird alookin' on an' singin' out ho- 

sanner, 
An' how he (Mister B. himself) wuz happy fer 

Ameriky, — 
I felt, ez sister Patience sez, a leetle mite histericky. 
I felt, I swon, ez though it wuz a dreffle kind o' priv- 
ilege 
Atrampin' round thru Boston streets among the 

gutter's drivelage ; 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 17 

I act'lly thought it wuz a treat to hear a little drurn- 

min', 
An' it did bonyfidy seem millanyum wuz acomin' 
Wen all on us got suits (darned like them wore iu the 

state prison) 
An' every feller felt ez though all Mexico wuz hisn. 1 

This 'ere 'a about the meanest place a skunk could wal 

diskiver 
(Saltillo "s Mexican, I Vlieve, fer wut we call Salt- 
river). 
The sort o' trash a feller gits to eat doos beat all nater, 
I 'd give a year's pay fer a smell o' one good bluenose 

tater ; 
The country here thet Mister Bolles declared to be so 

charmin' 
Throughout is swarmin' with the most alarmin' kind o' 

vormin'. 
He talked about delishis froots, but then it wuz a 

wopper all, 
The holl on't 's mud an' prickly pears, with here an' 

there a chapparal ; 



1 it must be aloud that thare 's a streak o' nater iu lovin' slio, but it 

- 1 of the curusest tilings in nater to see a rispecktable dri goods 

okon off a chutch mayby) a riggin' himself out iu the Weigh 

they du and s.truttin' round in the Reign aspilin' his trowsis and makin' 

wet goods of himself. Ef any thin 's foolislier and moor dicklus than 

militern gioary it is milishy gloary. — H. B. 

C 



18 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

You see a feller peekin' out, an', fust you know, a lariat 
Is round your throat an' you a copse, 'fore you can 

say, " Wut air ye at ? " 1 
You never see sech darned gret bugs (it may not be 

irrelevant 
To say I 've seen a scarabceus pilularius 2 big ez a year 

old elephant), 
The rigiment come up one day in time to stop a red 

bug 
From runnin' off with Cunnle Wright, — 't wuz jest a 

common cimex lectularius. 
One night I started up on eend an' thought I wuz to 

hum agin, 
I heern a horn, thinks I it 's Sol the fisherman hez 

come agin, 
His bellowses is sound enough, — ez I 'm a livin' creeter, 
I felt a thing go thru my leg, — 't wuz nothin' more 'n 

a skeeter ! 
Then there 's the yaller fever, tu, they call it here el 

vomito, — 
(Come, thet wun't du, you landcrab there, , I tell ye to 

le' go my toe ! 

1 these fellers are verry proppilly called Rank Heroes, and the more tha 
kill the ranker and more Herowick tha hekura. — H. B. 

2 it wuz "tumblebug" as he Writ it, hut the parson put the Latten 
instid. i sed tother maid better meeter, but he said tha was eddykated 
peepl to Boston and tha would n't stan' it no how. idnow as tha wood 
and idnow as tha wood. — H. B. 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 19 

My gracious ! it 's a scorpion thet 's took a shine to 
play with 't, 

I dan n't skeer the taraal thing fer fear he 'd run 
away with 't.) 

Afore I come away from hum I hed a strong per- 
suasion 

Thet Mexicans worn't human beans, 1 — an ourang 
outang nation, 

A sort o' folks a chap could kill an' never dream on 't 
arter, 

No more 'n a feller 'd dream o' pigs thet he hed hed 
to slarter ; 

I 'd an idee thet they were built arter the darkle 
fashion all, 

An kickin' coloured folks about, you know, 's a kind o' 
national ; 

But wen I jined I worn't so wise ez thet air queen o' 
Sheby, 

Fer, come to look at 'em, they aint much difFrent 
from wut we be, 

An' here we air ascrougin' 'em out o' thir own do- 
minions, 

Ashelterin' 'em, ez Caleb sez, under our eagle's pinions, 

Wich means to take a feller up jest by the slack o' 's 
trowsis 

1 he means human heins, that 's wut he means, i spose he kinder 
thought tha wuz human Deans ware the Xisle Poles comes from. — H.B. 

c2 



20 THE BTGLOW PAPERS. 

An' walk him Spanish cleau right out o' all his homes 

an' houses ; 
Wal, it doos seem a curus way, but then hooraw fer 

Jackson ! 
It must be right, fer Caleb sez it 's reg'lar Anglo- 

saxon. 
The Mex'cans don't fight fair, they say, they piz'n all 

the water, 
An' du amazin' lots o' things thet is n't wut they 

ough' to ; 
Bein' they haint no lead, they make their bullets out 

o' copper 
An' shoot the darned things at us, tu, wich Caleb sez 

aint proper ; 
He sez they 'd ough' to stan' right up an' let us pop 

'em fairly 
(Guess wen he ketches 'em at thet he '11 hev to git 

up airly), 
Thet our nation 's bigger 'n theirn an' so its rights air 

bigger, 
An' thet it 's all to make 'em free thet we air pullin' 

trigger, 
Thet Anglo Saxondom's idee 's abreakin' 'em to pieces, 
An' thet idee 's thet every man doos jest wut he damn 

pleases ; 
Ef I don't make his meanin' clear, perhaps in some 

respex I can, 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 21 

I know thct "every man" don't mean a nigger or 

a Mexican ; 
An" there 'a another thing I know, an' thet is, ef these 

ereeturs, 
Thet stick an Anglosaxon mask onto State-prison 

feeturSj 
Should come to Jaalam Centre fer to argify an' spoilt 

on't, 

The gals 'onld count the silver spoons the minnit they 
cleared out on 't. 

This goin' ware glory waits ye haint one agreeable 

feetur, 
An' ef it worn't fer wakin' snakes, I 'd home agin short 

meter j 
0, would n't I be off, quick time, ef 't worn't thet I 

wuz sartin 
They 'd let the daylight into me to pay me fer de- 

sartin ! 
I don't approve o' tellin' tales, but jest to you I may 

state 
Our ossifers aint wut they wuz afore they left the Bay- 
state ; 
Then it wuz " Mister Sawin, sir, you 're middltn' well 

now, be ye ? 
Step up an' take a nipper, sir j I 'm dreffle glad to see 

to;" 



22 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

But now it 's " Ware 's my eppylet ? here, Sawin, step 

an' fetch it ! 
An' mind your eye, be thund'rin' spry, or, damn ye, 

you shall ketch it ! " 
Wal, ez the Doctor sez, some pork will bile so, but by 

mighty, 
Ef I hed some on 'em to hum, I 'd give 'em linkum 

vity, 
I 'd play the rogue's march on their hides an' other 

music follerin' 

But I must close my letter here, for one on 'em 's 

ahollerin', 
These Anglosaxon ossifers, — wal, taint no use ajawin', 
I 'm safe enlisted fer the war, 

Yourn, 

BIKDOFREDOM SAWIN. 



[Those have not been wanting (as, indeed, when hath Satan 
been to seek for attorneys ?) who have maintained that onr 
late inroad upon Mexico was undertaken, not so much for the 
avenging of any national quarrel, as for the spreading of free 
institutions and of Protestantism. Capita vix duabus Anti- 
cyris medenda! Verily I admire that no pious sergeant among 
these new Crusaders beheld Martin Luther riding at the front 
of the host upon a tamed pontifical bull, as, in that former in- 
vasion of Mexico, the zealous Diaz (spawn though he were of 
the Scarlet Woman) was favoured with a vision of St. James 
of Compostella, skewering the infidels upon his apostolical 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 23 

lance. We read, also, that Richard of the lion heart, taring 
gone to Palestine on a similar errand of mercy, was divinely 
encouraged to cut the throats of such Paynims as refused to 
swallow the bread of life (doubtless that they might be there- 
after incapacitated for swallowing the filthy gobbets of Ma- 
hound) by angels of heaven, who cried to the king and his 
knights, — . iv.ez! tuez ! providentially using the 

French tongue, as being the only one understood by their 
auditors. This would argue for the pantoglottism of these 
celestial inteDigences, while, on the other hand, the Devil, 
iesie Cotton Mather, is unversed in certain of the Indian 
dialects. Yet must he be a semeiologist the most expert, 
making himself intelligible to every people and kindred by 
signs ; no other discourse, indeed, being needful, than such as 
the mackerel-fisher holds with his finned quarry, who, if other 
bait be wanting, can by a bare bit of white rag at the end of 
a string captivate those foolish fishes. Such piscatorial 
oratory is Satan cunning in. Before one he trails a hat and 
feather, or a bare feather without a hat; before another, a 
dential chair, or a tidewaiter's stool, or a pulpit in the 
city, no matter what. To us, dangling there over our heads, 
they seem junkets dropped out of the seventh heaven, sops 
dipped in nectar, but, once in our mouths, they are all one, 
bits of fuzzy cotton. 

This, however, by the way. It is time now rmocare grodum. 
While so many miracles of this sort, vouched by eye-witnesses, 
have encouraged the arms of Papists, not to speak of those 
Dioscuri (whom we must conclude imps of the pit) who sundry 
times captained the pagan Roman soldiery, it is strange that 
our first American crusade was not in some such wise also 
izrd. Yet it is said that the Lord hath manifestly pro- 
spered our armies. This opens the question, whether, when 
our hands are strengthened to make great slaughter of our 



24 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

enemies, it be absolutely and demonstratively certain that this 
might is added to us from above, or whether some Potentate 
from an opposite quarter may not have a finger in it, as there 
are few pies into which his meddling digits are not thrust. 
Would the Sanctifier and Setter-apart of the seventh day have 
assisted in a victory gained on the Sabbath, as was one in the 
late war ? Or has that day become less an object of his espe- 
cial care since the year 1697, when so manifest a providence 
occurred to Mr. William Trowbridge, in answer to whose 
prayers, when he and all on shipboard with him were starv- 
ing, a dolphin was sent daily, "which was enough to serve 
'em ; only on Saturdays they still catched a couple, and on the 
Lord's Days they could catch none at all"? Haply they might 
have been permitted, by way of mortification, to take some few 
sculpins (those banes of the salt-water angler), which unseemly 
fish would, moreover, have conveyed to them a symbolical re- 
proof for their breach of the day, being known in the rude 
dialect of our mariners as Cape Cod Clergymen. 

It has been a refreshment to many nice consciences to know 
that our Chief Magistrate would not regard with eyes of ap- 
proval the (by many esteemed) sinful pastime of dancing, and 
I own myself to be so far of that mind, that I could not but 
set my face against this Mexican Polka, though danced to the 
Presidential piping with a Gubernatorial second. If ever the 
country should be seized with another such mania de propa- 
ganda fide, I think it would be wise to fill our bombshells with 
alternate copies of the Cambridge Platform and the Thirty- 
nine Articles, which would produce a mixture of the highest 
explosive power, and to wrap every one of our cannon-balls in 
a leaf of the New Testament, the reading of which is denied 
to those who sit in the darkness of Popery. Those iron evan- 
gelists would thus be able to disseminate vital religion and 
Gospel truth in quarters inaccessible to the ordinary mis- 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 25 

nonary . I have seen lads, unimpregnatc with the more sub- 
limated punctiliousness of Walton, secure pickerel, taking 
their unwary siesta beneath the lily-pads too nigh the surface, 
with a gun and small shot. Why not, then, since gunpowder 
was unknown to the apostles (not to enter here upon the 
question whether it were discovered before that period by the 
Chinese), suit our metaphor to the age in which we live, and 
say shooters as well ssjishers of men? 

I do much fear that we shall be seized now and then with a 
Protestant fervour, as long as we have neighbour Naboths whose 
wallowings in Papistical mire excite our horror in exact pro- 
portion to the size and desirableness of their vineyards. Yet 
I rejoice that some earnest Protestants have been made by this 
war, — I mean those who protested against it. Fewer they 
were than I could wish, for one might imagine America to 
have been colonized by a tribe of those nondescript African 
animals the Aye-Ayes, so difficult a word is No to us all. 
There is some malformation or defect of the vocal organs, 
which either prevents our uttering it at all, or gives it so thick 
a pronunciation as to be unintelligible. A mouth filled with 
the national pudding, or watering in expectation thereof, is 
wholly incompetent to this refractory monosyllable. An abject 
and herpetic Public Opinion is the Pope, the Anti-Christ, for 
us to protest against e corde cordium. And by what College 
of Cardinals is this our God's-vicar, our binder and looser, 
elected ? Very like, by the sacred conclave of Tag, Rag, and 
Bobtail, in the gracious atmosphere of the grog-shop. Yet it 
is of this that we must all be puppets. This thumps the 
pulpit-cushion, this guides the editor's pen, this wags the 
senator's tongue. This decides what Scriptures are canonical, 
and shuffles Christ away into the Apocrypha. According to 
that sentence fathered upon Solon, Ovtco drjuoaiov kcikov 
Zpxerai ot*ca8 > tudora. This unclean spirit is skilful to assume 



26 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

various shapes. I have known it to enter my own study and 
nudge my elbow of a Saturday, under the semblance of a 
wealthy member of my congregation. It were a great bless- 
ing, if every particular of what in the sum we call popular 
sentiment could carry about the name of its manufacturer 
stamped legibly upon it. I gave a stab under the fifth rib to 
that pestilent fallacy, — "Our country, right or wrong," — by 
tracing its original to a speech of Ensign Cilley at a dinner of 
the Bungtown Fencibles. — H. W.] 






THE BIG LOW PAPERS. 27 

No. III. 

WHIT MR. ROBINSON THINKS. 

[A few remarks on the following verses will not be out of 
place. The satire in them was not meant to have any personal, 
but only a general, application. Of the gentleman upon whose 
letter they were intended as a commentary Mr. Biglow had 
never heard, till he saw the letter itself. The position of the 
satirist is oftentimes one which he would not have chosen had 
the election been left to himself. In attacking bad principles, 
he is obliged to select some individual who has made himself 
their exponent, and in whom they are impersonate, to the end 
that what he says may not, through ambiguity, be dissipated 
i in auras. For what says Seneca ? Longun iter per 
prcecepta, breve et efficace per exempla. A bad principle is 
comparatively harmless while it continues to be an abstraction, 
nor can the general mind comprehend it fully till it is printed 
in that large type which all men can read at sight, namely, the 
life and character, the sayings and doings, of particular persons. 
It is one of the cunningest fetches of Satan, that he never ex- 
poses himself directly to our arrows, but, still dodging behind 
this neighbour or that acquaintance, compels us to wound 
him through them, if at all. He holds our affections as 
hostages, the while he patches up a truce with our conscience. 
Meanwhile, let us not forget that the aim of the true satirist 
is not to be severe upon persons, but only upon falsehood : and, 
as Truth and Falsehood start from the same point, and some- 
times even go along together for a little way, his business is to 
follow the path of the latter after it diverges, and to show her 
floundering in the bog at the end of it. Truth is quite beyond 



28 THE B1GL0W PAPERS. 

the reach of satire. There is so brave a simplicity in her, that 
she can no more be made ridiculous than an oak or a pine. 
The danger of the satirist is, that continual use may deaden 
his sensibility to the force of language. He becomes more and 
more liable to strike harder than he knows or intends. He 
may be careful to put on his boxing-gloves, and yet forget, 
that, the older they grow, the more plainly may the knuckles 
inside be felt. Moreover, in the heat of contest, the eye is 
insensibly drawn to the crown of victory, whose tawdry tinsel 
glitters through that dust of the ring which obscures Truth's 
wreath of simple leaves. I have sometimes thought that my 
young friend, Mr. Biglow, needed a monitory hand laid on his 
arm, — aliquid suffiaminandus erat. I have never thought it 
good husbandry to water the tender plants of reform with aqua 
fortis, yet, where so much is to do in the beds, he were a sorry 
gardener who should wage a whole day's war with, an iron 
scuffle on those ill weeds that make the garden-walks of life 
unsightly, when a sprinkle of Attic salt will wither them up. 
Est ars etiam maledicendi, says Scaliger, and truly it is a hard 
thing to say where the graceful gentleness of the lamb merges 
in downright sheepishness. We may conclude with worthy 
and wise Dr. Fuller, that "one may be a lamb in private 
wrongs, but in hearing general affronts to goodness they are 
asses which are not lions." — H. W.] 

Guvener B. is a sensible man ; 

He stays to his home an' looks arter his folks j 
He draws his furrer ez straight ez he can, 
An' into nobody's tater-patch pokes ; — 
But John P. 
Kobinson he 
Sez he wunt vote fer Guvener B. 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 29 

My ! aint it terrible ? Wut shall we du? 

We can't never choose him, o' course, — thet's flat ; 
Guess we shall hev to come round, (don't you ?) 
An' go in fer thunder an 1 guns, an' all that ; 
Fer John P. 
Robinson he 
Sez he wunt vote fer Guvener B. 



Gineral C. is a dreffle smart man : 

He's ben on all sides thet give places or pelf ; 
But consistency still wuz a part of his plan, — 
He 's ben true to one party, — an' thet is himself y 
So John P. 
Robinson he 
Sez he shall vote fer Gineral C. 



Gineral C. he goes in fer the war ; 

He don't vally principle more 'n an old cud ; 
Wut did God make us raytional creeturs fer, 
But glory an' gunpowder, plunder an' blood ? 
So John P. 
Robinson he 
he shall vote fer Gineral 0. 



30 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

We were gittin' on nicely up here to our village, 

With good old idees o' wut 's right an' wut aint, 
We kind o' thought Christ went agin war an' pillage, 
An' thet eppyletts worn't the best mark of a saint ; 
But John P. 
Robinson he 
Sez this kind o' thing 's an exploded idee. 



The side of our country must oilers be took, 

An' Presidunt Polk, you know, he is our country ; 
An' the angel thet writes all our sins in a book 
Puts the debit to him, an' to us the per contry ; 
An' John P. 
Robinson he 
Sez this is his view o' the thing to a T. 



Parson Wilbur he calls all these argimunts lies ; 

Sez they 're nothin' on airth but jest fee, faw, fum; 
An' thet all this big talk of our destinies 
Is half on it ignorance, an' t'other half rum ; 
But John P. 
Robinson he 
Sez it aint no sech thing ; an', of course, so must we. 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 31 

Parson "Wilbur sez he never heerd in his life 

Thet th' Apostles rigged out in their swaller-tail coats 
An' marched round in front of a drum an' a fife, 
To git some on 'em office, an' some on 'em votes ; 
But John P. 
Kobinson he 
Sez they did n't know everythin' down in Judee. 



Wal, it 's a marcy we 've gut folks to tell us 

The rights an' the wrongs o' these matters, I vow,- 
God sends country lawyers, an' other wise fellers, 
To drive the world's team wen it gits in a slough ; 
Fcr John P. 
Robinson he 
Sez the world '11 go right, ef he hollers out Gee ! 



[The attentive reader will doubtless have perceived in the 
foregoing poem an allusion to that pernicious sentiment, — "Our 
country, right or wrong." It is an abuse of language to call 
a certain portion of land much more certain personages 
elevated for the time being to high station, our country. I 
would not sever nor loosen a single one of those ties by which 
we are united to the spot of our birth, nor minish by a tittle 
the respect due to the Magistrate. I love our own Bay State 
too well to do the one, and as for the other, I have myself for 
nigh forty years exercised, however unworthily, the function 
of Justice of the Peace, having been called thereto by the 



32 THE BIGLOW PAPEKS 

unsolicited kindness of that most excellent man and upright 
patriot, Caleb Strong. Patrice fumus igne alieno hiculentior is 
best qualified with this, — Ubi libertas, ibipatria. We are in- 
habitants of two worlds, and owe a double, but not a divided, 
allegiance. In virtue of our clay, this little ball of earth exacts 
a certain loyalty of us ; while, in our capacity as spirits, we are 
admitted citizens of an invisible and holier fatherland. There 
is a patriotism of the soul whose claim absolves us from our 
other and terrene fealty. Our true country is that ideal realm 
which we represent to ourselves under the names of religion, 
duty, and the like. Our terrestrial organizations are but far- 
off approaches to so fair a model, and all they are verily 
traitors who resist not any attempt to divert them from this 
their original intendment. When, therefore, one would have 
us to fling up our caps and shout with the multitude, — " Our 
country, however bounded /" he demands of us that we sacrifice 
the larger to the less, the higher to the lower, and that we 
yield to the imaginary claims of a few acres of soil our duty 
and privilege as liegemen of Truth. Our true country is 
bounded on the north and the south, on the east and the west, 
by Justice, and when she oversteps that invisible boundary- 
line by so much as a hair's-breadth, she ceases to be our 
mother, and chooses rather to be looked upon quasi noverca. 
That is a hard choice, when our earthly love of country calls 
upon us to tread one path and our duty points us to another. 
We must make as noble and becoming an election as did 
Penelope between Icarius and Ulysses. Yeiling our faces, we 
must take silently the hand of Duty to follow her. 

Shortly after the publication of the foregoing poem, there 
appeared some comments upon it in one of the public prints 
which seemed to call for some animadversion. I accordingly 
addressed to Mr. Buckingham, of the Boston Courier, the fol- 
lowing letter. 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 33 

<; Jaalam, November 4, 1847. 
Editor of the Courier : 

"Respected Sir.— Calling at the post-office this morning, 
worthy and efficient postmaster offered for my perusal a 
paragraph in the Boston Morning Post of the 3d instant, 
wherein certain effusions of the pastoral muse are attributed 
to the pen of Mr. James Russell Lowell. For ought I know 
or can affirm to the contrary, this Mr. Lowell may be a very 
deserving person and a youth of parts (though I have seen 
verses of his which I could never rightly understand); and if 
he be such, he, I am certain, as well as I, would be free from 
any proclivity to appropriate to himself whatever of credit (or 
discredit) may honestly belong to another. I am confident, 
that, in penning these few lines, I am only forestalling a dis- 
claimer from that young gentleman, whose silence hitherto, 
when rumour pointed to himward, has excited in my bosom 
mingled emotions of sorrow and surprise. Well may my 
young parishioner, Mr. Biglow, exclaim with the poet, 

" ' Sic vos non vobis ' See. ; 
though, in saying this, I would not convey the impression that 
he is a proficient in the Latin tongue,— the tongue, I might 
add, of a Horace and a Tully. 

" Mr. B. does not employ his pen, I can safely say, for any 
lucre of worldly gain, or to be exalted by the carnal plaudits of 
men, digito moiutrari, &c. He does not wait upon Providence 
for mercies, and in his heart mean merces. But I should 
n myself as verily deficient in my duty (who am his friend 
and in some unworthy sort his spiritual yfe Achates, &c), if 
I did not step forward to claim for him whatever measure of 
applause might be assigned to him by the judicious. 

"H this were a fitting occasion, I might venture here a brief 
dissertation touching the manner and kind of my young friend 1 - 
D 



34 THE-BIGLOW PAPERS. 

poetry. But I dubitate whether this abstruser sort of specula- 
tion (though enlivened by some apposite instances from Aris- 
tophanes) would sufficiently interest your oppidan readers. 
As regards their satirical tone, and their plainness of speech, 
I will only say, that, in my pastoral experience, I have found 
that the Arch-Enemy loves nothing better than to be treated 
as a religious, moral, and intellectual being, andtbat there is no 
apage Sathanas ! so potent as ridicule. But it is a kind of wea- 
pon that must have a button of good-nature on the point of it. 

" The productions of Mr. B. have been stigmatized in some 
quarters as unpatriotic; but I can vouch that he loves his 
native soil with that hearty, though discriminating, attachment 
which springs from an intimate social intercourse of many 
years' standing. In the ploughing season, no one has a deeper 
share in the well-being of the country than he. If Dean Swift 
were right in saying that he who makes two blades of grass grow 
where one grew before confers a greater benefit on the state 
than he who taketh a city, Mr. B. might exhibit a fairer claim 
to the Presidency than General Scott himself. I think that 
some of those disinterested lovers of the hard-handed demo- 
cracy, whose fingers have never touched anything rougher 
than the dollars of our common country, would hesitate to 
compare palms with him. It would do your heart good, re- 
spected Sir, to see that young man now. He cuts a cleaner 
and wider swarth than any in this town. 

"But it is time for me to be at my Post. It is very clear 
that my young friend's shot has struck the lintel, for the Post 
is shaken (Amos ix. 1). The editor of that paper is a strenu- 
ous advocate of the Mexican war, and a colonel, as I am given 
to understand. I presume, that, being necessarily absent in 
Mexico, he has left his journal in some less judicious hands. 
At. any rate, the Post has been too swift on this occasion. It 
could hardly have cited a more incontrovertible line from any 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 35 

poem than that which it has selected for animadversion, 
namely, — 

'• ' We kind o' thought Christ went agin war an' pillage.' 

" If the Post maintains the converse of this proposition, it 
can hardly be considered as a safe guide-post for the moral and 
_ eras portions of its party, however many other excellent 
qualities of a post it may be blessed with. There is a sign in 
London on which is painted,— c The Green Man.' It would 
do very well as a portrait of any individual who would support 
so unscriptural a thesis. As regards the language of the line 
in question, I am bold to say that He who readeth the hearts 
of men will not account any dialect unseemly which conveys 
a sound and pious sentiment. I could wish that such senti- 
ments were more common, however uncouthly expressed. 
Saint Ambrose affirms, that Veritas a quocunque (why not, then 

docunque ?) dicatur, a spirit u saneto est. Digest also this 
of Baxter : — ' The plainest words are the most profitable 
oratory in weightiest matters.' 

" When the paragraph in question was shown to Mr. Biglow, 
the only part of it which seemed to give him any dissatisfaction 
was that which classed him with the Whig party. He says, 
that, if resolutions are a nourishing kind of diet, that party 
must be in a very hearty and flourishing condition ; for that 
they have quietly eaten more good ones of their own baking 
than he could have conceived to be possible without repletion. 
He has been for some years past (I regret to say) an ardent 
opponent of those sound doctrines of protective policy which 

so prominent a portion of the creed of that party. I 
confess, that, in some discussions which I have had with him 
on this point in my study, he has displayed a vein of obstinacy 

I had not hitherto detected in his composition. He is 
also (korresco referens) infected in no small measure with the 



36 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

peculiar notions of a print called the Liberator, whose heresies 
I take every proper opportunity of combating, and of which, 
I thank God, I have never read a single line. 

" I did not see Mr. B/s verses until they appeared in print, 
and there is certainly one thing in them which I consider 
highly improper. 1 allude to the personal references to myself 
by name. To confer notoriety on an humble individual who is 
labouring quietly in his vocation, and who keeps his cloth as 
free as he can from the dust of the political arena (though v<z 
mihi si non evangelizavero), is no doubt an indecorum. The 
sentiments which he attributes to me I will not deny to be 
mine. They were embodied, though in a different form, in a 
discourse preached upon the last day of public fasting, and 
were acceptable to my entire people (of whatever political 
views), except the postmaster, who dissented ex officio. I 
observe that you sometimes devote a portion of your paper to 
a religious summary. I should be well pleased to furnish a 
copy of my discourse for insertion in this department of your 
instructive journal. By omitting the advertisements, it might 
easily be got within the limits of a single number, and I 
venture to insure you the sale of some scores of copies in this 
town. I will cheerfully render myself responsible for ten. It 
might possibly be advantageous to issue it as an extra. But 
perhaps you will not esteem it an object, and I will not press 
it. My offer does not spring from any weak desire of seeing 
my name in print ; for I can enjoy this satisfaction at any time 
by turning to the Triennial Catalogue of the University, where 
it also possesses that added emphasis of Italics with which 
those of my calling are distinguished. 

" I would simply add, that I continue to fit ingenuous 
youth for college, and that I have two spacious and airy 
sleeping apartments at this moment unoccupied. Ingenuas 
didicisse, &c. Terms, which vary according to the circumstances 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 37 

of the parents, may be known on application to me by letter, 
post paid. In all cases the lad will be expected to fetch his 
own towels. This rule, Mrs. TV*, desires me to add, has no 
exceptions. 

" Respectfully, your obedient servant, 

"HOMER WILBUR, A.M. 

" P.S. Perhaps the last paragraph may look like an attempt 
to obtain the insertion of my circular gratuitously. If it should 
appear to you in that light, I desire that you would erase it, or 
charge for it at the usual rates, and deduct the amount from 
the proceeds in your hands from the sale of my discourse, when 
11 be printed. My circular is much longer and more ex- 
plicit, and will be forwarded without charge to any who may 
desire it. It has been very neatly executed on a letter sheet, 
by a very deserving printer, who attends upon my ministry, 
and is a creditable specimen of the typographic art. I have 
one hung over my mantelpiece in a neat frame, where it makes 
a beautiful and appropriate ornament, and balances the profile 
of Mrs. W., cut with her toes by the young lady born without 
arms. H. \Y." 

I have in the foregoing letter mentioned General Scott in 
connexion with the Presidency, because I have been given to 
understand that he has blown to pieces and otherwise caused 
to be destroyed more Mexicans than any other commander. 
Bifl claim would therefore be deservedly considered the 
strongest. Until accurate returns of the Mexican killed, 
wounded, and maimed be obtained, it would be difficult to 
settle these nice points of precedence. Should it prove that 
any other officer has been more meritorious and destructive 
than General S., and has thereby rendered himself more 



38 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

worthy of the confidence and support of the conservative 
portion of our community, I shall cheerfully insert his name, 
instead of that of General S., in a future edition. It may be 
thought, likewise, that General S. has invalidated his claims 
by too much attention to the decencies of apparel, and the 
habits belonging to a gentleman. These abstruser points of 
statesmanship are beyond my scope. I wonder not that 
successful military achievement should attract the admiration 
of the multitude. Rather do I rejoice with wonder to behold 
how rapidly this sentiment is losing its hold upon the popular 
mind. It is related of Thomas Warton, the second of that 
honoured name who held the office of Poetry Professor at 
Oxford, that, when one wished to find him, being absconded, 
as was his wont, in some obscure alehouse, he was counselled 
to traverse the city with a drum and fife, the sound of which 
inspiring music would be sure to draw the Doctor from his 
retirement into the street. We are all more or less bitten 

with this martial insanity. Nescio qua dulcedine 

cunctos ducit. I confess to some infection of that itch myself. 
When I see a Brigadier- General maintaining his insecure 
elevation in the saddle under the severe fire of the training- 
field, and when I remember that some military enthusiasts, 
through haste, inexperience, or an over-desire to lend reality 
to those fictitious combats, will sometimes discharge their 
ramrods, I cannot but admire, while I deplore, the mistaken 
devotion of those heroic officers. Semel insanivimus omnes. I 
was myself, during the late war with Great Britain, chaplain 
of a regiment, which was fortunately never called to active 
military duty. I mention this circumstance with regret rather 
than pride. Had I been summoned to actual warfare, I trust 
that I might have been strengthened to bear myself after the 
manner of that reverend father in our New England Israel, Dr. 
Benjamin Colman, who, as we are told in Turell's life of him, 



THE BIGLOW PAT 39 

when the vessel in which he had taken passage for England 

3 attacked by a French privateer, " fought like a philosopher 

and a Christian, ...... and prayed all the while he charged 

and fired." As this note is already long, I shall not here enter 
upon a discussion of the question, whether Christians may 
lawfully be soldiers. I tliink it sufficiently evident, that, 
during the first two centuries of the Christian era, at least, 
the two professions were esteemed incompatible. Consult 
Jortin on this head. — H. W.] , 



40 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 



No. IV. 

REMARKS OP INCREASE D. O'PHACE, ESQUIRE, AT AN EX- 
TRUMPERY CAUCUS IN STATE STREET, REPORTED BY MR. 
H. BIGLOW. 

[The ingenious reader will at once understand that no such 
speech as the following was ever totidem verbis pronounced. 
But there are simpler and less guarded wits, for the satisfying 
of which such an explanation may be needful. For there are 
certain invisible lines, which as Truth successively overpasses, 
she becomes Untruth to one and another of us, as a large 
river, flowing from one kingdom into another, sometimes takes 
a new name, albeit the waters undergo no change, how small 
soever. There is, moreover, a truth of fiction more veracious 
than the truth of fact, as that of the Poet, which represents to 
us things and events as they ought to be, rather than servilely 
copies them as they are imperfectly imaged in the crooked and 
soioky glass of our mundane affairs. It is this which makes 
the speech of Antonius, though originally spoken in no wider 
a forum than the brain of Shakspeare, more historically valu- 
able than that other which Appian has reported, by as much 
as the understanding of the Englishman was more comprehen- 
sive than that of the Alexandrian. Mr. Biglow, in the present 
instance, has only made use of a licence assumed by all the 
historians of antiquity, who put into the mouths of various 
characters such words as seem to them most fitting to the 
occasion and to the speaker. If it be objected that no such 
oration could ever have been delivered, I answer, that there 
are few assemblages for speech-making which do not better 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 41 

deserve the title of Parliament »m Indoctonm than did the 
sixth Parliament of Henry the Fourth, and that men still con- 
tinue to have as much faith in the Oracle of Fools as ever 
Pantagruel had. Howell, in his letters, recounts a merry tale 
of a certaiu ambassador of Queen Elizabeth, who, having 
written two letters, one to her Majesty and the other to his 
wife, directed them at cross-purposes, so that the Queen was 
beducked and bedearcd and requested to send a change of hose, 
and the wife was beprincessed and otherwise unwontedly be- 
superlatived, till the one feared for the wits of her ambassador, 
the other for those of her husband. In like manner it may be 
presumed that our speaker has misdirected some of his thoughts, 
and given to the whole theatre what he would have wished to 
confide only to a select auditory at the back of the curtain. 
For it is seldom that we can get any frank utterance from men, 
who address, for the most part, a Buncombe either in this 
world or the next. As for their audiences, it may be truly 
-aid of our people, that they enjoy one political institution in 
common with the ancient Athenians : I mean a certain profit- 
kind of ostracism! wherewith, nevertheless, they seem 
hitherto well enough content. For in Presidential elections, 
and other affairs of the sort, whereas I observe that the oysters 
fall to the lot of comparatively few, the shells (such as the pri- 
vileges of voting as they are told to do by the ostrioorl aforc- 
and of huzzaing at public meetings) are very liberally 
distributed among the people, as being their prescriptive and 
quite sufficient portion. 

The occasion of the speech is supposed to be Mr. Palfrey's 
- ;1 to vote for the Whig candidate for the Speakership. — 
II. YY\] 



42 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

No? Hez he? He haint, though? Wut? Voted 

agin him ? 
Ef the bird of our country could ketch him, she 'd skin 

him ; 
I seem 's though I see her, with wrath in each quill, 
Like a chancery lawyer, afilin' her bill, 
An' grindin' her talents ez sharp ez all nater, 
To pounce like a writ on the back o' the trait er. 
Forgive me, my friends, ef I seem to be het, 
But a crisis like this must with vigour be met ; 
Wen an Arnold the star-spangled banner bestains, 
Holl Fourth o' Julys seem to bile in my veins. 



Who ever 'd ha' thought sech a pisonous rig 
Would be run by a chap thet wuz chose fer a Wig ? 
" We knowed wut his principles wuz 'fore we sent 

him " ? 
What wuz ther in them from this vote to pervent him 1 
A marciful Providunce fashioned us holler 
0' purpose thet we might our principles swaller ; 
It can hold any quantity on 'em, the belly can, 
An' bring 'em up ready fer use like the pelican, 
Or more like the kangaroo, who (wich is stranger) 
Puts her family into her pouch wen there 's danger. 
Aint principle precious ? then, who 's goin' to use it 
Wen there 's risk o' some chaps gittin' up to abuse it ? 



THE BIG LOW PAPERS. 43 

I can't tell the wy on 't, but nothin is so sure 
Ez thet principle kind o' gits spiled by exposure j l 
A man thet lets all sorts o' folks git a sight on 't 
Ough' to hev it all took right away, every mite on't ; 
Ef he can't keep it all to himself when it's wise to, 
He aint one it 'a fit to trust nothin' so nice to. 



Besides, ther 's a wonderful power in latitude 
To shift a man's morril relations an' attitude ; 
Some flossifers think thet a fakkilty 's granted 
The minnit it's proved to be thoroughly wanted, 
Thet a change o' demand makes a change o' condition 
An' thet everythin' 's nothin' except by position ; 
Ez, fer instance, thet rubber-trees fust begun bearin' 
Wen p'litickle conshunces come into wearin', — 
Thet the fears of a monkey, whose holt chanced to fail, 
Drawed the vertibry out to a prehensile tail ; 
So, wen one 's chose to Congriss, ez soon ez he 's in it, 
A collar grows right round his neck in a minnit, 



1 The speaker is of a different mind from Tully, wlio, in his recently 
discovered tractate De RepuMica, tells us, — Nee vero habere virtutem satis 
est, quasi artem atiquam, nisi utare, and from our Milton, who says, — " I 
cannot praise a fugitive and cloistered virtue, unexercised and unhreathed, 
that never sallies out and sees her adversary, but slinks out of the race 
where that immortal garland is to be run for, not without dust and heat." 
>p. He had taken the words out of the Roman's mouth, without 
knowing it, and might well exclaim with Austin (if a saint's name may 
stand sponsor for a curse), Pereant qui ante nos nostra dixcrini .' — II. W. 



44 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

An' sartin it is thet a man cannot be strict 
In bein' himself, when he gets to the Deestrict, 
Fer a coat thet sets wal here in ole Massachusetts, 
Wen it gits on to Washinton, somehow askew sets. 



Resolves, do you say, o' the Springfield Convention ? 

Thet 's percisely the pint I was goin' to mention ; 

Resolves air a thing we most gen'ally keep ill, 

They 're a cheap kind o' dust fer the eyes o' the people ; 

A parcel o' delligits jest git together 

An' chat fer a spell o' the crops an' the weather. 

Then, comin' to order, they squabble awile 

An' let off the speeches they're ferful '11 spile ; 

Then — Resolve, — Thet we wunt hev an inch o' slave 

territory ; 
That President Polk's holl perceedins air very tory ; 
Thet the war 's a damned war, an' them thet enlist in it 
Should hev a cravat with a dreffle tight twist in it ; 
Thet the war is a war fer the spreadin' o' slavery ; 
Thet our army desarves our best thanks fer their bravery; 
Thet we 're the original friends o' the nation, 
All the rest air a paltry an' base fabrication ; 
Thet we highly respect Messrs. A, B, an' C, 
An' ez deeply despise Messrs. E, F, an' G. 
In this way they go to the eend o' the chapter, 
An' then they bust out in a kind of a raptur 



THE BIG LOW PAPB 45 

About their own vartoo, an' folks's stone-blindness 
To the men thet 'ould actilly do 'em a kindness, — 
The American eagle, the Pilgrims thet landed, 
Till on ole Plymouth Rook they git finally stranded. 
Walj the people they listen and sn.y, *' Thet's the ticket ! 
Ez for Mexico, faint no glory to lick it, 
But 't would be a darned shame to go pullin' o' triggers 
:end the aree of abusin' the niggers." 

So they march in percessions, an' git up hooraws, 
An" tramp thru the mud fer the good o' the cause, 
An* think they "re kind o' fulfillin' the prophecies, 
Wen they're on'y jest changin' the holders of offices j 
Ware A sot afore, B is comf 'tably seated, 
One humbug 'a victorious, an' t'other defeated. 
Each honnable doughface gits jest wut he axes, 
An' the people — their annooal soft sodder an' taxes. 

Xow, to keep unimpaired all these glorious feeturs 

Thet characterize morril an' reasouin creeturs, 

Thet give every paytriot all he can cram, 

Thet oust the untrustworthy Presidunt Flam, 

An' stick honest Presidunt Sham in his place, 

To the manifest gain o' the holl human race, 

An' to some indervidgewals on 't in partickler, 

Who love Public Opinion an' know how to tickle her, — 

I say thet a party with great aims like these 

Must stick jest ez close ez a hive full o' bees. 



46 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

I 'm willin' a man should go tollable strong 

Agin wrong in the abstract, fer that kind o' wrong 

Is oilers unpop'lar an' never gits pitied. 

Because it 's a crime no one never committed ; 

But he mus' n't be hard on partickler sins, 

Coz then he '11 be kickin' the people's own shins ; 

On'y look at the Demmercrats, see wut they 've done 

Jest simply by stickin' together like fun ; 

They've sucked us right into a mis'able war 

Thet no one on airth aint responsible for ; 

They 've run us a hundred cool millions in debt, 

(An' fer Demmercrat Homers ther 's good plums 

left yet) ; 
They talk agin tayriffs, but act fer a high one, 
An' so coax all parties to build up their Zion ; 
To the people they 're oilers ez slick ez molasses, 
An' butter their bread on both sides with The Masses, 
Half o' whom they 've persuaded, by way of a joke, 
Thet Washinton's mantelpiece fell upon Polk. 

Now all o' these blessins the Wigs might enjoy, 
Ef they' d gumption enough the right means to imploy ; x 
Fer the silver spoon born in Dermocracy's mouth 
Is a kind of a scringe thet they hev to the South ; 
Their masters can cuss 'em an' kick 'em an' wale 'em, 

1 That was a pithy saying of Persius, and fits our politicians without a 
wrinkle, — Magister artis, ingeniique largitor venter. — H. W. 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 17 

An' they notice it less 'an the ass did to Balaam ; 

In this way they screw into second-rate offices 

Wich the slaveholder thinks 'onld substract too much 

off his ease ; 
The file-leaders, I mean, dn, fer they, by their wiles, 
Unlike the old viper, grow fat on their files. 
Wal, the Wigs hev been tryin' to grab all this prey 

from 'em 
An' to hook this nice spoon o' good fortin away frum 'em, 
An' they might ha' succeeded, ez likely ez not, 
In lickin' the Demmercrats all round the lot, 
Ef it wara't thet. wile all faithful Wigs were their 

knees on, 
Some stuffy old codger would holler out, — "Treason ! 
You must keep a sharp eye on a dog thet hez bit you 

once, 
An' 7 aint agoin' to cheat my const itoounts," — 
Wen every fool knows thet a man represents 

the fellers thet sent him, but them on the fence, — 
Impartially ready to jump either side 
An" make the fust use of a turn o' the tide, — 
The waiters on Providunce here in the city, 
Who compose wut they call a State Centerl Committy. 

• itoounts air hendy to help a man in, 
But arterwards don't weigh the heft of a pin. 
Wy. the people can't all live on Uncle Sam's pus, 
So they *ve nothin' to du with 't fer better or wus \ 



48 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

It's the folks thet air kind o' brought up to de- 
pend on 't 
That hev any consarn in 't, an' thet is the end on 't. 

Now here wuz New England ahevin' the honor 

Of a chance at the speakership showered upon her • — 

Do you say, — " She don't want no more Speakers, but 

fewer ; 
She 's hed plenty o' them, wut she wants is a doer " f 
Fer the matter o' thet, it 's notorous in town 
Thet her own representatives du her quite brown. 
But thet 's nothin' to du with it ; wut right hed Palfrey 
To mix himself up with fanatical small fry 1 
Warn't we gettin' on prime with our hot an' cold 

blowing 
Acondemnin' the war wilst we kep' it agoin' ? 
We 'd assumed with gret skill a commandin' position, 
On this side or thet, no one could n't tell wich one, 
So, wutever side wipped, we 'd a chance at the plunder 
An' could sue for infringin' our paytended thunder ; 
We were ready to vote fer whoever wuz eligible, 
Ef on all pints at issoo he 'd stay unintelligible. 
Wal, sposin' we hed to gulp down our perfessions, 
We were ready to come out next mornin' with fresh 

ones; 
Besides, ef we did, 't was our business alone, 
Fer could n't we du wut we would with our own 1 






THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 49 

An' ef a man can, wen pervisions hev riz so, 
Eat up his own words, it 's a rnarcy it is so. 

Wy, these chaps from the North, with back-bones to 

'em, darn 'em, 
'Ould be wuth more 'an Gennle Tom Thumb is to 

Bamum ; 
Ther 's enough thet to office on this very plan grow, 
By exhibitin' how very small a man can grow ; 
But an M. C. frum here oilers hastens to state he 
Belongs to the order called invertebraty, 
Wence some gret filologists judge primy fashy 
Thet M. C. is M. T. by paronomashy; 
An' these few exceptions air loosus naytury 
Folks 'ould put down their quarters to stare at, like 

fury. 

It "s no use to open the door o' success, 
Ef a member can bolt so fer nothin' or less ; 
Wy, all o' them grand constitootional pillers 
Our four fathers fetched with 'em over the billers, 
.Them pillers the people so soundly hev slept on, 
Wile to slav'ry, invasion, an' debt they were swept on, 
Wile our Destiny higher an' higher kep' mountin' 
(Though I guess folks '11 stare wen she hends her 
account in), 

E 



50 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

Ef members in this way go kickin' agin 'em, 
They wunt hev so much ez a feather left in 'em. 

An', ez fer this Palfrey, 1 we thought wen we 'd gut 

him in, 
He 'd go kindly in wutever harness we put him in ; 
Supposin' we did know thet he wuz a peace man 1 
Does he think he can be Uncle Samwell's policeman, 
*An' wen Sam gits tipsy an' kicks up a riot, 
Lead him off to the lockup to snooze till ne 's quiet ? 
Wy, the war is a war thet true paytriots can bear, ef 
It leads to the fat promised land of a tayriff ; 
We don't go an' fight it, nor aint to be driv on, 
Nor Demmercrats nuther, thet hev wut to live on ; 
Ef it aint jest the thing thet's well pleasin' to God, 
It makes us thought highly on elsewhere abroad ; 
The Rooshian black eagle looks blue in his eerie 
An' shakes both his heads wen he hears o' Monteery ; 
Wile in the Tower Victory sets, all of a fluster, 
An' reads, with locked doors, how we won Cherry 

Buster ; 
An' old Philip Lewis — thet come an' kep' school here 
Fer the mere sake o' scorin' his ryalist ruler 
On the tenderest part of our kings infuturo — 
Hides his crown underneath an old shut in his bureau, 

1 There is truth yet in this of Juvenal, — 

" Dat veniam corvis, vexat censura columhas." 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 51 

Breaks oft* in his brags to a suckle o' merry kings, 
How he often hed hided young native Amerrikius, 
An", turnin' quite faint in the midst of his fooleries, 
Sneaks down stairs to bolt the front door o' the 
Tooleries. 1 

You say. — " We 'd ha' scared 'em by growin' in peace, 
A plaguy sight more then by bobberies like these " ? 
Who is it dares say thet " our naytional eagle 
Wim't much longer be classed with the birds thet air 

regal, 
Coz theira be hooked beaks, an' she, arter this slaughter, 
*11 bring back a bill ten times longer 'n she ough' to"? 
Wut 's your name ? Come, I see ye, you up-country 

feller. 
You 've put me out severil times with your beller ; 

1 Jortin is willing to allow of other miracles besides those recorded in 
Holy Writ, and why not of other prophecies ? It is granting too much to 
^atan to suppose him, as divers of the learned have done, the inspirer of 
the ancient oracles. Wiser, I esteem it to give chnnce the credit of the 
successful ones. What is said here of Louis Philippe was verified in some 
of its minute particulars within a few months' time. Enough to have 
made the fortune of Delphi or Ammon, and no thanks to Beelzebub 
neither ! That of Seneca in Medea will suit here : — 

"Rapida fortuna ac levis, 
Prcecepsque regno eripuit, exsilio dedit." 

s all v., even to richly dpserved misfortune, our commiseration, 
and be not overhisty meanwhile in our censure of the French people, left 
for tiie first time to govern themselves, rem? inhering that wise sentence of 
./Eschylus, — 

di Tpax't <'<tti<, av v4ov Kparrj. U V> . 

e2 



52 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

Out with it ! Wut ? Biglow 1- I say nothin' fiirder, 

Thet feller would like nothin' better 'n a murder ; 

He 's a traiter, blasphemer, an' wut ruther worse is, 

He put all his ath'ism in dreffle bad verses ; 

Soeity aint safe till sech monsters air out on it, 

Refer to the Post, ef you hev the least doubt on it ; 

Wy, he goes agin war, agin indirect taxes, 

Agin sellin' wild lands 'cept to settlers with axes, 

Agin holdin' o' slaves, though he knows it 's the corner 

Our libbaty rests on, the mis'able scorner ! 

In short, he would wholly upset with his ravages 

All thet keeps us above the brute critters an' savages, 

An' pitch into all kinds o' briles an' confusions 

The holl of our civilized, free institutions ; 

He writes fer thet rather unsafe print, the Courier, 

An' likely ez not hez a squintin' to Foorier ; 

I' 11 be , thet is, I mean I '11 be blest, 

Ef I hark to a word frum so noted a pest ; 
I shan't talk with him, my religion 's too fervent. — 
Good mornin', my friends, I 'm your most humble 
servant. 



[Into the question, whether the ability to express ourselves 
in articulate language has been productive of more good or 
evil, I shall not here enter at large. The two faculties of 
speech and of speech-making are wholly diverse in their 
natures. By the first we make ourselves intelligible, by the 
last unintelligible, to our fellows. It has not seldom occurred 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 53 

to me (uoting how in our national legislature everything runs 
to talk., as lettuces, if the season or the soil be unpropitious, 
shoot up lankly to seed, instead of forming handsome heads) 
that Babel was the first Congress, the earliest mill erected for 
the manufacture of gabble. In these days, what with Town 
Meetings, School Committees, Boards (lumber) of one kind 
and another, Congresses, Parliaments, Diets, Indian Councils, 
Palavers, and the like, there is scarce a village which has not 
its factories of this description driven by (milk-and-) water 
power. I cannot conceive the confusion of tongues to have 
been the curse of Babel, since I esteem my ignorance of other 
languages as a kind of Martello-tower, in which I am safe 
from the furious bombardments of foreign garrulity. For this 
reason I have ever preferred the study of the dead languages, 
those primitive formations being Ararats upon whose silent 
peaks I sit secure and watch this new deluge without fear, 
though it rain figures (simulacr*, semblances) of speech forty 
days and nights together, as it not uncommonly happens. Thus 
is my coat, as it were, without buttons by which any but a 
vernacular wild bore can seize me. Is it not possible that the 
Shakers may intend to convey a quiet reproof and hint, in 
fastening their outer garments with hooks and eyes ? 

This reflection concerning Babel, which I find in no Com- 
mentary, was first thrown upon my mind when an excellent 
deacon of my congregation (being infected with the Second 
Advent delusion) assured me that he had received a first 
instalment of the gift of tongues as a small earnest of larger 
possessions in the like kind to follow. For, of a truth, I could 
not reconcile it with my ideas of the Divine justice and mercy 
that the single wall which protected people of other languages 
from the incursions of this otherwise well-meaning propa- 
gandist should be broken down. 

In reading Congressional debates, I have fancied, that, after 



54 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

the subsidence of those painful buzzings in the brain which 
result from such exercises, I detected a slender residuum of 
valuable information. I made the discovery that nothing takes 
longer in the saying than anything else, for, as ex nihilo nihil 
Jit, so from one polypus nothing any number of similar ones 
may be produced. I would recommend to the attention of 
viva voce debaters and controversialists the admirable example 
of the monk Copres, who, in the fourth century, stood for half 
an hour in the midst of a great fire, and thereby silenced a 
Manichaean antagonist who had less of the salamander in 
him. As for those who quarrel in print, I have no concern 
with them here, since the eyelids are a Divinely-granted shield 
against all such. Moreover, I have observed in many modern 
books that the printed portion is becoming gradually smaller, 
and the number of blank or fly-leaves (as they are called) 
greater. Should this fortunate tendency of literature con- 
tinue, books will grow more valuable from year to year, and 
the whole Serbonian bog yield to the advances of firm arable 
land. 

I have wondered, in the Representatives' Chamber of our 
own Commonwealth, to mark how little impression seemed to 
be produced by that emblematic fish suspended over the heads 
of the members. Our wiser ancestors, no doubt, hung it there 
as being the animal which the Pythagoreans reverenced for its 
silence, and which certainly in that particular does not so well 
merit the epithet cold-blooded, by which naturalists distinguish 
it, as certain bipeds, afflicted with ditch-water on the brain, 
who take occasion to tap themselves in Fanueil Halls, meeting- 
houses, and other places of public resort. — H. W.] 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 55 



No. V. 
THE DEBATE IX THE SENNIT. 

SOT TO A NTJSBY RHYALE. 

[The iucidcDt which gave rise to the debate satirized in the 
following verses was the unsuccessful attempt of Drayton and 
Sayres to give freedom to seventy men and women, fellow- 
beings and fellow-Christians. Had Tripoli, instead of Wash- 
ington, been the scene of this undertaking, the unhappy leaders 
in it would have been as secure of the theoretic as they 
now are of the practical part of martyrdom. I question 
whether the Dey of Tripoli is blessed with a District Attorney 
so benighted as ours at the seat of government. Very fitly is 
he named Key, who would allow himself to be made the 

Linent of locking the door of hope against sufferers in 
Mich a cause. Not all the waters of the ocean can cleanse 
the vile smutch of the jailer's fingers from off that little Key. 
Ahenea clavis, a brazen Key indeed ! 

Mr. Calhoun, who is made the chief speaker in this bur- 
lesque, seems to think that the light of the nineteenth century 
is to be put out as soon as he tinkles his little cow-bell curfew. 

never slavery is touched, he sets up his scarecrow of 
dissolving the Union. This may do for the North, but I 
should conjecture that something more than a pumpkin-lantern 
is required to scare manifest and irretrievable Destiny out of 
her path. Mr. Calhoun cannot let go the apron-string of the 

. The Past is a good nurse, but we must be weaned from 



56 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

her sooner or later, even though, like Plotinus, we should run 
home from school to ask the breast, after we are tolerably 
well-grown youths. It will not do for us to hide our faces in 
her lap, whenever the strange Future holds out her arms and 
asks us to come to her. 

But we are all alike. We have all heard it said, often 
enough, that little boys must not play with fire ; and yet, if 
the matches be taken away from us and put out of reach upon 
the shelf, we must needs get into our little corner, and scowl 
and stamp and threaten the dire revenge of going to bed 
without our supper. The world shall stop till we get our 
dangerous plaything again. Dame Earth, meanwhile, who has 
more than enough household matters to mind, goes bustling 
hither and thither as a hiss or a sputter tells her that this 
or that kettle of hers is boiling over, and before bedtime we 
are glad to eat our porridge cold, and gulp down our dignity 
along with it. 

Mr. Calhoun has somehow acquired the name of a great 
statesman, and, if it be great statesmanship to put lance in 
rest and run a tilt at the Spirit of the Age with the certainty 
of being next moment hurled neck and heels into the dust 
amid universal laughter, he deserves the title. He is the Sir 
Kay of our modern chivalry. He should remember the old 
Scandinavian mythus. Thor was the strongest of gods, but 
he could not wrestle with Time, nor so much as lift up a fold 
of the great snake which knit the universe together ; and when 
he smote the Earth, though with his terrible mallet, it was but 
as if a leaf had fallen. Yet all the while it seemed to Thor 
that he had only been wrestling with an old woman, striving 
to lift a cat, and striking a stupid giant on the head. 

And in old times, doubtless, the giants were stupid, and 
there was no better sport for the Sir Launcelots and Sir 
Gawains than to go about cutting off their great blundering 



THE BIG LOW PAPERS. 57 

heads with enchanted swords. But things have wonderfully 
changed. It is the giants, now-a-days, that have the science 
and the intelligence, while the chivalrous Don Quixotes of 
Conservatism still cumber themselves with the clumsy armour 
of a by-gone age. On whirls the restless globe through un- 
sounded time, with its cities and its silences, its births and 
funerals, half light, half shade, but never wholly dark, and 
sure to swing round into the happy morning at last. With 
an involuntary smile, one sees Mr. Calhoun letting slip his 
pack-thread cable with a crooked phi at the end of it to 
anchor South Carolina upon the bank and shoal of the Past. 
-H. W.] 

TO MR. BUCKEXAM. 

MR. Editer, As i wuz kinder prunin round, in a 
little nussry sot out a year or 2 a go, the Dbait in the 
sennit cum inter my mine An so i took & Sot it to 
wut I call a nussry rime. I hev made sum onnable 
Gentlemun speak that dident speak in a Kind uv 
Poetikul lie sense the seeson is dreffle backerd up 
This way 

ewers as ushul 

HOSEA BIGLOW. 



58 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

" Here we stan' on the Constitution, by thunder ! 

It 's a fact o' wich ther 's bushils o' proofs j 
Fer how could we trample on 't so, I wonder, 
Eft worn't thet it 's oilers under our hoofs ? " 
Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he ; 

" Human rights haint no more 
Right to come on this floor, 
No more 'n the man in the moon," sez he. 

" The North haint no kind o' bisness with nothin', 
An' you 've no idee how much bother it saves ; 
We aint none riled by their frettin' an' frothing 
We 're used to layin' the string on our slaves," 
Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he ; — 
Sez Mister Foote, 
" I should like to shoot 
The holl gang, by the gret horn spoon ! " sez he. 

" Freedom's Keystone is Slavery, thet ther 's no doubt 

OD, 

It 's sutthin' thet 's — wha' d' ye call it 1 — divine, — 
An' the slaves thet we oilers make the most out on 
Air them north o' Mason an' Dixon's line," 
Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he ; — 
" Fer all thet," sez Mangum, 
" 'T would be better to hang 'em, 
An' so git red on 'em soon," sez he. 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. oO 

" The mass ough' to labour an' we lay on somes, 

Thet 's the reason I want to spread Freedom's aree ; 
It puts all the cuuninest on us in office, 
An' reelises our Maker's orig'nal idee," 
Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he ; — 
M Thet 's ez plain," sez Cass, 
M Ez thet some one 's an ass, 
It 's ez clear cz the suu is at noon," sez he. 

- Xow don't go to say I 'm the friend of oppression, 

But keep all your spare breath fer coolin' your broth, 
Fer I oilers hev strove (at least thet 's my impression) 
To make cussed free with the rights o' the North," 
Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he ; — 
•• Yes," sez Davis o' Miss., 
" The perfection o' bliss 
Is in skinnin' thet same old coon," sez he. 

very 's a thing thet depends on complexion, 
It 's God's law thet fetters on black skins don't chafe ; 
Ef brains wuz to settle it (horrid reflection !) 
Wich of our onnable body 'd be safe ? " 
Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he ; — 
Sez Mister Hannegan, 
Afore he began agin, 
" Thet exception is quite oppertoon," sez he. 



60 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

" Gen'nle Cass, Sir, you need n't be twitchin' your collar, 

Your merit 's quite clear by the dut on your knees, 
At the North we don't make no distinctions o' colour ; 
You can all take a lick at our shoes wen you please," 
Sez John 0. Calhoun, sez he ; — 
Sez Mister Jarnagin, 
" They wunt hev to larn agin, 
They all on 'em know the old toon," sez he. 

" The slavery question aint no ways bewilderin'. 

North an' South hev one in t' rest, it 's plain to a glance; 
No'thern men, like us patriarchs, don't sell their childrin, 
But they du sell themselves, ef they git a good 
chance," 
Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he ; — 
Sez Atherton here, 
" This is gittin' severe, 
I wish I could dive like a loon," sez he. 

" It '11 break up the Union, this talk about freedom, 

An' your fact'ry gals (soon ez we split) '11 make head, 
An' gittin' some Miss chief or other to lead 'em, 
'11 go to work raisin' promiscoous Ned," 
Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he ; — 

" Yes, the North," sez Colquitt, 
" Ef we Southerners all quit, 
Would go down like a busted balloon," sez he. 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 61 

• Jest look wut is doin', vrut annyky's brewin' 
In the beautiful clime o' the olive an' vine, 
All the wise ahstoxy is tumblin' to ruin, 

An' the sankylots drorin' an' drinkin' their wine,'" 
Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he ; — 

" Yes;' sez Johnson, " in France 
They 're beginnin' to dance 
Beelzebub's own rigadoon," sez he. 

•• The South 's safe enough, it don't feel a mite skeery, 

Our slaves in their darkness an' dut air tu blest 
Not to welcome with proud hallylugers the ery 

Wen our eagle kicks yourn from the naytional nest," 
Sez John C. Calhoun, sez he ; — 
" 0," sez Wcstcott o' Florida, 
•■ Wat treason is horrider 
Then our priv'leges tryin' to proon 1 " sez he. 

" It's 'coz they're so happy, thet, wen crazy sarpints 

Stick their nose in our bizness, we git so darned riled ; 
We think it 's our dooty to give pooty sharp hints, 
Thet the last crumb of Edin on airth shan't be 
spiled," 

John C. Calhoun, sez he ; — 
" Ah,"-sez Dixon PL Lewis, 
" It perfectly true is 
Thet slavery's airth's grettest boon," sez lie. 



62 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

[It was said of old time, that riches have wings ; and, though 
this be not applicable in a literal strictness to the wealth of 
our patriarchal brethren of the South, yet it is clear that their 
possessions have legs, and an unaccountable propensity for 
using them in a northerly direction. I marvel that the grand 
jury of Washington did not find a true bill against the North 
Star for aiding and abetting Drayton and Sayres. It would 
have been quite of a piece with the intelligence displayed by 
the South on other questions connected with slavery. I think 
that no ship of state was ever freighted with a more veritable 
Jonah than this same domestic institution of ours. Mephisto- 
pheles himself could not feign so bitterly, so satirically sad a 
sight as this of three millions of human beings crushed beyond 
help or hope by this one mighty argument, — Our fathers knew 
w better! Nevertheless, it is the unavoidable destiny of 
Jonahs to be cast overboard sooner or later. Or shall we try 
the experiment of hiding our Jonah in a safe place, that none 
may lay hands on him to make jetsam of him ? Let us, then, 
with equal forethought and wisdom, lash ourselves to the an- 
chor, and await, in pious confidence, the certain result. Per- 
haps our suspicious passenger is no Jonah after all, being 
black. Eor it is well known that a superintending Providence 
made a kind of sandwich of Ham and his descendants, to be 
devoured by the Caucasian race. 

In God's name, let all, who hear nearer and nearer the 
hungry moan of the storm and the growl of the breakers, 
speak out ! But, alas ! we have no right to interfere. If a 
man pluck an apple of mine, he shall be in danger of the 
justice; but if he steal my brother, I must be silent. Who 
says this ? Our Constitution, consecrated by the callous 
suetude of sixty years, and grasped in triumphant argument 
in the left hand of him whose right hand clutches the clotted 
slave- whip. Justice, venerable with the undethronable majesty 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 63 

of countless aeons, says, — Speak ! The Past, wise with the 
sorrows and desolations of ages, from amid her shattered fanes 
and wolf-housing palaces, echoes, — Speak ! Nature, through 
her thousand trumpets of freedom, her stars, her sunrises, her 
seas, her winds, her cataracts, her mountains blue with cloudy 
pines, blows jubilant encouragement, and cries, — Speak ! 
From the soul's trembling abysses the still, small voice not 
vaguely murmurs, — Speak ! But, alas ! the Constitution and 
the Honourable Mr. Bagowind, M.C., say, — Be dumb ! 

It occurs to me to suggest, as a topic of inquiry iu this con- 
nexion, whether, on that momentous occasion when the goats 
and the sheep shall be parted, the Constitution and the Hon- 
ourable Mr. Bagowind, M.C., will be expected to take their 
places on the left as our hircine vicars. 

Quia sum miser tunc dictnrus ? 
Quern pair onum rogaturus ? 

There is a point where toleration sinks into sheer baseness and 
poltroonery. The toleration of the worst leads us to look on 
what is barely better as good enough, and to worship what is 
only moderately good. TToe to that man, or that nation, to 
whom mediocrity has become an ideal ! 

Has our experiment of self-government succeeded, if it barely 
manage to rub and go ? Here, now, is a piece of barbarism 
which Christ and the nineteenth century say shall cease, and 
winch Messrs. Smith, Brown, and others say shall not cease. 
I would by no means deny the eminent respectability of these 
gentlemen, but I confess, that, in such a wrestling-match, I 
cannot help having my fears for them. 

'eji'.stitiam, moniii, ei non temnere dicos. 

H. W.] 



64 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 



No. VI. 
THE PIOUS EDITOR'S CREED. 

[At the special instance of Mr. Biglow, I preface the fol- 
lowing satire with an extract from a sermon preached during 
the past summer, from Ezekiel xxxiv. 2 : — " Son of man, pro- 
phesy against the shepherds of Israel." Since the Sabbafch on 
which this discourse was delivered, the editor of the " Jaalam 
Independent Blunderbuss " has unaccountably absented himself 
from our house of worship. 

" I know of no so responsible position as that of the public 
journalist. The editor of our day bears the same relation to 
his time that the clerk bore to the age before the invention of 
printing. Indeed, the position which he holds is that which 
the clergyman should hold even now. But the clergyman 
chooses to walk off to the extreme edge of the world, and to 
throw such seed as he has clear over into that darkness which 
he calls the Next Life. As if next did not mean nearest, and as 
if any life were nearer than that immediately present one which 
boils and eddies all around him at the caucus, the ratification 
meeting, and the polls ! Who taught him to exhort men to 
prepare for eternity, as for some future era of which the 
present forms no integral part ? The furrow which Time is 
even now turning runs through the Everlasting, and in that 
must he plant or nowhere. Yet he would fain believe and 
teach that we are going to have more of eternity than we have 
now. This going of his is like that of the auctioneer, on which 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 6o 

ijoie follows before we have made up our minds to bid, — in 
which manner, not three months back, I lost an excellent eopj 
of Chappelow on Job. So it has come to pass that the 
preacher, instead of being a living force, has faded into an 
emblematic ligure at christenings, weddings, and funerals. 
Or, if he exercise any other function, it is as keeper and feeder 
of certain theologic dogmas, which, when occasion offers, he 
unkennels with a sfaboj/f ' to bark and bite as 'tis their nature 
to,' whence that reproach of odium tlieohfjictim has arisen. 

" Meanwhile, see what a pulpit the editor mounts daily, 
sometimes with a congregation of fifty thousand within reach 
of his voice, and never so much as a nodder, even, among 
them ! And from what a Bible can he choose his text, — a 
Bible which needs no translation, and which no priestcraft can 
shut and clasp from the laity, — the open volume of the world, 
upon which, with a pen of sunshine or destroying fire, the 
inspired Present is even now writing the annals of God ! 
Mcthinks the editor who should understand his calling, and be 
equal thereto, would truly deserve that title of ttoijx^v \aa>v, 
which Homer bestows upon princes. He would be the Moses 
of our nineteenth century ; and whereas the old Sinai, silent 
now, is but a common mountain, stared at by the elegant 
tourist and crawled over by the hammering geologist, he must 
find lus tables of the new law here among factories and cities 
in this Wilderness of Sin (Numbers xxxiii. 12) called Progress 
of Civilization, and be the captain of our Exodus into the 
Canaan of a truer social order. 

" Nevertheless, our editor will not come so far within even 
the shadow of Sinai as Mahomet did, but chooses rather to 
construe Moses by Joe Smith. He takes up the crook, not 
that the sheep may be fed, but that he may never want a 
warm woollen suit and a joint of mutton. 

Immemor, 0, fidei, pecorumque ohlite tuorum ! 
F 



66 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

For which reason I would derive the name editor not so much 
from edo, to publish, as from edo, to eat, that being the 
peculiar profession to which he esteems himself called. He 
blows up the flames of political discord for no other occasion 
than that he may thereby handily boil his own pot. I believe 
there are two thousand of these mutton-loving shepherds in 
the United States ; and of these, how many have even the 
dimmest perception of their immense power, and the duties 
consequent thereon? Here and there, haply, one. Nine 
hundred and ninety-nine labour to impress upon the people the 
great principles of Tweedledum, and other nine hundred and 
ninety-nine preach with equal earnestness the gospel according 
to Tweedledee."—K. W.] 

I du believe in Freedom's cause, 

Ez fur away ez Paris is ; 
I love to see her stick her claws 

In them infarnal Pharisees ; 
It 's wal enough agin a king 

To dror resolves an' triggers, — 
But libbaty 's a kind o' thing 

Thet don't agree with niggers. 

I du believe the people want 

A tax on teas an' coffees, 
Thet nothin' aint extravygunt, — 

Purvidin' I 'm in office ; 
Fer I hev loved my country sence 

My eye-teeth filled their sockets, 
An' Uncle Sam I reverence, 

Partic'larly his pockets. 



THE BIGLOW PAP1 <i~ 

I du believe in any plan 

0' levyin' the taxes, 
Ez long ez, like a lumberman, 

I git jest wut I axes : 
I go free-trade thru thick an' thin, 

Because it kind o' rouses 
The folks to vote, — an' keeps us in 

Our quiet custom-houses. 

I du believe it 's wise an' good 

To sen' out furrin missions, 
Thet is, on sartin understood 

An' orthydox conditions; — 
I mean nine thousan' dolls, per aim., 

Nine thousan' more fer outfit, 
An' me to recommend a man 

The place 'ould jest about fit. 



I du believe in special ways 

0' pray in' an' convartin' ; 
The bread comes back in many days, 

An' buttered, tu, fer sartin ; — 
I mean in preyin' till one busts 

On wut the party chooses, 
An' in convartin' public trusts 

To very privit uses. 



68 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

I du believe hard coin the stuff 

Fer 'lectioneers to spout on ; 
The people 's oilers soft enough 

To make hard money out on ; 
Dear Uncle Sam pervides fer his, 

An' gives a good-sized junk to all,- 
I don't care how hard money is, 

Ez long ez mine 's paid punctooal. 



I du believe with all my soul 

In the gret Press's freedom, 
To pint the people to the goal 

An' in the traces lead 'em ; 
Palsied the arm thet forges yokes 

At my fat contracts squintin', 
An' withered be the nose thet pokes 

Inter the gov'ment printin' ! 



I du believe thet I should give 

Wut 's his'n unto Caesar, 
Fer it 's by him I move an' live, 

From him my bread an' cheese air ; 
I du believe thet all o' me 

Doth bear his souperscription, — 
Will, conscience, honour, honesty, 

An' things o' thet description. 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

I du believe in prayer an praise 

To him thet bez the gran tin' 
> jobs, — in every thin' thet pays, 

But most of all in Caxtix' j 
This doth my cup with marcies fill, 

This lays all thought o' sin to rest. — 
! ■'( believe in princerple, 

But, 0, I du in interest. 



I du believe in bein' this 

Or thet, ez it may happen 
One way or t'other hendiest is 

To ketch the people nappin' ; 
It aint by princerples nor men 

My preudunt course is steadied, — 
I scent wich pays the best, an' then 

Go into it baldheaded. 



I du believe thet holdin' sla 

Comes nat'ral tu a Presidunt, 
Let 'lone the rowdedow it saves 

To hev a wal-broke precedunt ; 
Fer any office, small or gret, 

I could n't ax with no face, 
Without I 'd ben, thru dry an' wet, 

Tli' imrizzest kind o' doughface. 



70 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

I du believe wutever trash 

'11 keep the people in blindness, — 
Thet we the Mexicuns can thrash 

Eight inter brotherly kindness, 
Thet bombshells, grape, an' powder 'n' ball 

Air good-will's strongest magnets, 
Thet peace, to make it stick at all, 

Must be druv in with bagnets. 

In short, I firmly du believe 

In Humbug generally, 
Fer it 's a thing thet I perceive 

To hev a solid vally; 
This heth my faithful shepherd ben, 

In pasturs sweet heth led me, 
An' this '11 keep the people green 

To feed ez they hev fed me. 



[I subjoin here another passage from my before-mentioned 
discourse. 

" Wonderful, to him that has eyes to see it rightly, is the 
newspaper. To me, for example, sitting on the critical front 
bench of the pit, in my study here in Jaalam, the advent of my 
weekly journal is as that of a strolling theatre, or rather of a 
puppet-show, on whose stage, narrow as it is, the tragedy, 
comedy, and farce of life are played in little. Behold the 



TH!-: BIGLOW TArERS. 71 

whole huge earth scut to me hcbdomadally in a brown-paper 
wrapper ! 

" Hither, to my obscure corner, by wind or steam, ou horse- 
back or dromedary -back, iu the pouch of the Indian runner, or 
clicking over the mag tic wires, troop all the famous per- 
formers from the four quarters of the globe. Looked at from 
a poiut of criticism, tiuy puppets they seem all, as the editor 
up his booth upon my desk and officiates as showman. 
Now 1 can truly see how little and transitory is life. The 
earth appears almost as a drop of vinegar, on which the solar 
microscope of the imagination must be brought to bear in order 
to make out any thing distinctly. That animalcule there, in 
the pea-jacket, is Louis Philippe, just landed on the coast of 
England. That other, in the grey surtout and cocked hat, is 
Napoleon Bonaparte Smith, assuring France that she need 
apprehend no interference from him in the present alarming 
juncture. At that spot, where you seem to see a speck of 
something in motion, is an immense mass-meeting. Look 
t, and you will see a mite brandishing his mandibles in 
an excited manner. That is the great Mr. Soandso, denning 
his position amid tumultuous and irrepressible cheers. That 
infinitesimal creature, upon whom some score of others, as 
minute as he, are gazing in open-mouthed admiration, is a 
famous philosopher, expounding to a select audience their 
capacity for the Infinite. That scarce discernible pufflet of 
smoke and dust is a revolution. That speck there is a reformer, 
just arranging the lever with which he is to move the world. 
And lo, there creeps forward the shadow of a skeleton that 
blows one breath between its grinning teeth, and all our dis- 
tinguished actors are whisked off the slippery stage iuto the 
dark Beyond. 

" Yes, the little show-box has its solemner suggestions. 
. and then we catch a glimpse of a grim old man, wl • 



72 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

down a scythe and hour-glass in the corner while he shifts the 
scenes. There, too, in the dim background, a weird shape is 
ever delving. Sometimes he leans upon his mattock, and gazes, 
as a coach whirls by, bearing the newly married on their wed- 
ding jaunt, or glances carelessly at a babe brought home from 
christening. Suddenly (for the scene grows larger and larger 
as we look) a bony hand snatches back a performer in the 
midst of his part, and him, whom yesterday two infinities (past 
and future) would not suffice, a handful of dust is enough to 
cover and silence for ever. Nay, we see the same fleshless 
fingers opening to clutch the showman himself, and guess, not 
without a shudder, that they are lying in wait for spectator 
also. 

" Think of it : for three dollars a year I buy a season- 
ticket to this great Globe Theatre, for which God would write 
the dramas (only that we like farces, spectacles, and the 
tragedies of Apollyon better), whose scene-shifter is Time, and 
whose curtain is rung down by Death. 

" Such thoughts will occur to me sometimes as I am tearing 
off the wrapper of my newspaper. Then suddenly that other- 
wise too often vacant sheet becomes invested for me with a 
strange kind of awe. Look ! deaths and marriages, notices of 
inventions, discoveries, and books, lists of promotions, of killed, 
wounded, and missing, news of fires, accidents, of sudden 
wealth and as sudden poverty ; — I hold in my hand the ends 
of myriad invisible electric conductors, along which tremble 
the joys, sorrows, wrongs, triumphs, hopes, and despairs of as 
many men and women everywhere. So that upon that mood 
of mind which seems to isolate me from mankind as a spectator 
of their puppet-pranks, another supervenes, in which I feel 
that I, too, unknown and unheard of, am yet of some import 
to my fellows. For, through my newspaper here, do not 
families take pains to send me, an entire stranger, news of a 



THE BIGLOW PAPBBS. 73 

death among them? Are not here two who would have me 
know of their marriage ? And strangest of all, is not this 
singular person anxious to have me informed that he has 
received a fresh supply of Dimitry Bruisgins ? But to none 
of us does the Present (even if for a moment discerned as such) 
continue miraculous. We glance carelessly at the sunrise, and 
gel used to Orion and the Pleiades. The wonder wears oft', 
and to-morrow this sheet, in which a vision was let down to 
me from Heaven, shall be the wrappage to a bar of soap or the 
platter for a beggar's broken victuals." — H. W.] 



74 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 



No. VII. 
A LETTER 

FROM A CANDIDATE FOR THE PRESIDENCY IN ANSWER TO SUTTIN 
QUESTIONS PROPOSED BY MR. HOSEA BIGLOW, INCLOSED IN 
A NOTE FROM MR. BIGLOW TO S. H. GAY, ESQ., EDITOR OF 
THE NATIONAL ANTI-SLAVERY STANDARD. 

[Curiosity may be said to be the quality which pre-eminently 
distinguishes and segregates man from the lower animals. As 
we trace the scale of animated nature downward, we find this 
faculty of the mind (as it may truly be called) diminished in 
the savage, and quite extinct in the brute. The first object 
which civilized man proposes to himself I take to be the finding- 
out whatsoever he can concerning his neighbours. Nihil 
humanum a me alienum puto ; I am curious about even John 
Smith. The desire next in strength to this (an opposite pole, 
indeed, of the same magnet) is that of communicating intelli- 
gence. 

Men in general may be divided into the inquisitive and the 
communicative. To the first class belong Peeping Toms, 
eaves-droppers, navel- contemplating Brahmins, metaphysicians, 
travellers, Empedocleses, spies, the various societies for pro- 
moting Rhinothism, Columbuses, Yankees, discoverers, and 
men of science, who present themselves to the mind as so 
many marks of interrogation wandering up and down the 
world, or sitting in studies and laboratories. The second 
class I should again subdivide into four. In the first sub- 
division I would rank those who have an itch to tell us 



THE BIGLOW PAF1 75 

about themselves, -as keepers of diaries, insignificant persons 
generally, Montaignes, Horace Walpoles, autobiographers, 
poets. The second includes those who arc anxious to impart 
information concerning other people,— as historians, barbers, 
and such. To the thud belong those who labour to give us 
intelligence about nothing at all,— as novelists, political 
orators, the large majority of authors, preachers, lecturers, 
and the like. In the fourth come those who are communicative 
from motives of public benevolence,— as finders of mares'- 
- and bringers of ill news. Each of us two-legged fowls 
without feathers embraces all these subdivisions in himself to 
a greater or less degree, for none of us so much as lays an egg, 
or incubates a chalk one, but straightway the whole barn-yard 
shall know it by our cackle or our cluck. Omnibus hoc vitium 
There arc different grades in all these classes. One 
will turn his telescope toward a back-yard, another toward 
L'rauus; one will tell you that he dined with Smith, another 
that he supped with Plato. In one particular, ail men may be 
considered as belonging to the first grand division, inasmuch 
they all seem equally desirous of discovering the mote in 
their neighbour'scye. 

To one or another of these species every human being may 
safely be referred. I think it beyond a peradventurc that 
Jonah prosecuted some inquiries into the digestive apparatus 
of whales, and that Noah sealed up a letter in an empty bottle, 
that news in regard, to him might not be wanting in case of 
the worst. They had else been super or subter human. 1 
conceive, also, that, as there are certain persons who continu- 
ally peep and pry at the key -hole of that mysterious door 
through which, sooner or later, we all make our exits, so there 
are doubtless ghosts fidgeting and fretting on the other side 
of it, because they have no means of conveying back to the 
world the scraps of news they have picked up. For there is 



76 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

an answer ready somewhere to every question, the great law 
of give and take runs through all nature, and if we see a hook, 
we may be sure that an eye is waiting for it. I read in every 
face I meet a standing advertisement of information wanted in 
regard to A. B., or that the friends of C. D. can hear of him 
by application to such a one. 

It was to gratify the two great passions of asking and 
answering, that epistolary correspondence was first invented. 
Letters (for by this usurped title epistles are now commonly 
known) are of several kinds. First, there are those which are 
not letters at all, — as letters patent, letters dimissory, letters 
inclosing bills, letters of administration, Pliny's letters, letters 
of diplomacy, of Cato, of Mentor, of Lords Lyttelton, Chester- 
field, and Orrery, of Jacob Behmen, Seneca (whom St. Jerome 
includes in his list of sacred writers), letters from abroad, 
from sons in college to their fathers, letters of marque, and 
letters generally, which are in no wise letters of mark. 
Second, are real letters, such as those of Gray, Cowper, Wal- 
pole, Howel, Lamb, the first letters from children (printed in 
staggering capitals), Letters from New York, letters of credit, 
and others, interesting for the sake of the writer or the thing 
written. I have read also letters from Europe by a gentleman 
named Pinto, containing some curious gossip, and which I 
hope to see collected for the benefit of the curious. There are, 
besides, letters addressed to posterity, — as epitaphs, for 
example, written for their own monuments by monarchs, 
whereby we have lately become possessed of the names of 
several great conquerors and kings of kings, hitherto unheard 
of and still unpronounceable, but valuable to the student of 
the entirely dark ages. The letter which St. Peter sent to 
King Pepin in the year of grace 755 I would place in a class 
by itself, as also the letters of candidates, concerning which I 
shall dilate more fully in a note at the end of the following 



TIIE BIGLOW PAPERS. 77 

poem. At present, sat pro (a libera nt. Only, concerning the 
shape of letters, they arc all either square or oblong, to which 
general figures circular letters and rouud-robius also conform 
themselves.— H. W.] 



Deer sir its gut to be the fasliun dow to rite letters 
to the caudid 8s and i wus chose at a publick Meetin 
in Jaalam to du wut wus nessary fur that town, i writ 
to 271 giuerals and gut ansers to 209. tha air called 
candid 8s hut I don't see nothin candid about em. 
this here 1 wich I send wus thought satty's factory. 
I dunno as it's nshle to print Poscrips, but as all the 
ansers I got hed the saim, I sposed it wus best, times 
has gretly changed. Formaly to knock a man into a 
cocked hat wus to use him up, but now it ony gives 
him a chance fur the cheef madgustracy. — H. B. 



Dear Sir, — You wish to know my notions 

On sartin pints thet rile the land ; 
There 's nothin' thet my natur so shuns 

Ez bein' mum or underhand ; 
I 'm a straight-spoken kind o' creetur 

Thet blurts right out wut 's in his head, 
An' ef I 've one pecooler feetur, 

It is a nose thet wunt be led. 



78 THE BIGLOW PAPEES. 

So, to begin at the beginnin', 

An' come direcly to the pint, 
I think the country's underpinnin' 

Is some consid'ble out o' jint ; 
I aint agoin' to try your patience 

By tellin' who done this or thet, 
I don't make no insinooations, 

I jest let on I smell a rat. 

Thet is, I mean, it seems to me so, 

But, ef the public think I 'm wrong, 
I wunt deny but wut I be so, — 

An', fact, it don't smell very strong ; 
My mind 's tu fair to lose its balance 

An' say wich party hez most sense ; 
There may be folks o' greater talence 

Thet can't set stiddier on the fence. 



I 'm an eclectic ; ez to choosin' 

'Twixt this an' thet, I 'm plaguy lawth ; 
I leave a side thet looks like losin', 

But (wile there 's doubt) I stick to both ; 
I stan' upon the Constitution, 

Ez preudunt statesmun say, who 've planned 
A way to git the] most profusion 

0' chances ez to ware they '11 stand. 



THE BIGLOW PAPER& 70 

Ez fer the war, I go agin it, — 

I mean to say I kind o* da, — 
Thet is, I mean thet, bein' in it, 

The best way wuz to fight it thru ; 
Not but wut abstract war is horrid, — 

I sign to thet with all niy heart. — 
But civlyzation doos git forrid 

Sometimes upon a powder-cart. 

About thet darned Proviso matter 

I never bed a grain o' doubt, 
Nor I aint one my sense to scatter 

So's no one could n't pick it out ; 
My love fer North an' South is equil, 

So I "11 jest answer plump air frank, 
Xo matter wut may be the sequil, — 

Yes, Sir, I am agin a Bank. 

Ez to the answerin' o' questions, 

I 'm an off ox at bein' druv, 
Though I aint one thet ary test shuns 

'11 give our folks a helpin' shove ; 
Kind o' promiscoous I go it 

Fer the boll country, an' the ground 
I take, ez nigh ez I can show it, 

Is pooty gen'ally all round. 



80 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

I don't appruve o' givin' pledges ; 

You 'd ough' to leave a feller free, 
An' not go knockin' out the wedges 

To ketch his fingers in the tree ; 
Pledges air awfle breachy cattle 

Thet preudunt farmers don't turn out, 
Ez long 'z the people git their rattle, 

Wut is there fer 'm to grout about ? 

Ez to the slaves, there 's no confusion 

In my idees consarnin' them, — 
/ think they air an Institution, 

A sort of — yes, jest so, — ahem : 
Do / own any ? Of my merit 

On thet pint you yourself may jedge ; 
All is, I never drink no sperit, 

Nor I haint never signed no pledge. 



Ez to my principles, I glory 

In hevin' nothin' o' the sort ; 
I aint a Wig, I aint a Tory, 

I 'm jest a candidate, in short ; 
Thet 's fair an' square an' parpendicler, 

But, ef the Public cares a fig, 
To hev me an' thin' in particler, 

Wy I 'm a kind o' peri- wig. 



THE B1GL0W PAPBB& 81 

P. s. 

Ez we 're a sort o' privateerin', 

0' course, you know, it 's sheer an' sheer, 
An' there is sutthin' wuth your hearin' 

I '11 mention in your privit ear ; 
Ef you git me inside the White House, 

Your head with ile I '11 kin' o' 'nint 
By gittin' you inside the Light-house 

Down to the eend o' Jaalam Pint. 

An' ez the Xorth hez took to brustlin' 

At bein' scrouged frum off the roost, 
I '11 tell ye wut '11 save all tusslin' 

An' give our side a harnsome boost, — 
Tell 'em thet on the Slavery question 

I 'm right, although to speak I 'm lawth ; 
This gives you a safe pint to rest on, 

An' leaves me frontin' South by North. 



[And now of epistles candidatial, which arc of two kinds, — 
namely, letters of acceptance, and letters definitive of position. 
Our republic, on the eve of an election, may safely enough be 
called a republic of letters. Epistolary composition becomes 
then an epidemic, which seizes one candidate after another, not 
seldom cutting short the thread of political life. It has come 
to such a pass, that a party dreads less the attacks of its oppo- 
nents than a letter from its candidate. Litera scripta rnanct, 
G 



82 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

and it will go hard if something bad cannot be made of it. 
General Harrison, it is well understood, was surrounded, during 
his candidacy, with the cordon sanitaire of a vigilance com- 
mittee. No prisoner in Spielberg was ever more cautiously 
deprived of writing materials. The soot was scraped carefully 
from the chimney-places ; outposts of expert rifle-shooters 
rendered it sure death for any goose (who came clad in fea- 
thers) to approach within a certain limited distance of North 
Bend ; and all domestic fowls about the premises were reduced 
to the condition of Plato's original man. By these precautions 
the General was saved. Tarva componere magnis, I remember, 
that, when party-spirit once ran high among my people, upon 
occasion of the choice of a new deacon, I, having my prefer- 
ences, yet not caring too openly to express them, made use of 
an innocent fraud to bring about that result which I deemed 
most desirable. My stratagem was no other than the throwing 
a copy of the Complete Letter- Writer in the way of the can- 
didate whom I wished to defeat. He caught the infection, 
and addressed a short note to his constituents, in which the 
opposite party detected so many and so grave improprieties 
(he had modeled it upon the letter of a young lady accepting 
a proposal of marriage), that he not only lost his election, but, 
falling under a suspicion of Sabellianism and I know not what 
(the widow Endive assured me that he was a Paralipomenon, 
to her certain knowledge), was forced to leave the town. Thus 
it is that the letter killeth. 

The object which candidates propose to themselves in writing 
is to convey no meaning at all. And here is a quite unsus- 
pected pitfall into which they successively plunge headlong. 
For it is precisely in such cryptographies that mankind are 
prone to seek for and find a wonderful amount and variety of 
significance. Omne ignotum pro mirifico. How do we admire 
at the antique world striving to crack those oracular nuts from 



THE BIGLOW PAPEK>. 83 

Delphi, Amnion, and elsewhere, in only one of which can I 
so much as surmise that any kernel had ever lodged; that, 
namely, wherein Apollo confessed that he was mortal. One 
Didymus is, moreover, related to have written six thousand 
books on the single subject of grammar, a topic rendered only 
more tenebrific by the labours of his successors, and which 
seems still to possess an attraction for authors in proportion 
as they can make nothing of it. A singular loadstone for 
theologians, also, is the Beast in the Apocalypse, whereof, in 
the course of my studies, I have noted two hundred and three 
several interpretations, each lethiferal to all the rest. Non 
nostrum est tantas componere lites, yet I have myself ventured 
upon a two hundred and fourth, which I embodied in a dis- 
course preached on occasion of the demise of the late usurper, 
Napoleon Bonaparte, and which quieted, in a large measure, 
the minds of my people. It is true that my views on this im- 
portant point were ardently controverted by Mr. Shearjashub 
Holden, the then preceptor of our academy, and in other par- 
ticulars a very deserving and sensible young man, though pos- 
sessing a somewhat limited knowledge of the Greek tongue. 
But his heresy struck down no deep root, and, he having been 
lately removed by the hand of Providence, I had the satisfaction 
of re-affirming my cherished sentiments in a sermon preached 
upon the Lord's-day immediately succeeding his funeral. This 
might seem like taking an unfair advantage, did I not add that 
he had made provision in his last will (being celibate) for the 
publication of a posthumous tractate in support of his own 
dangerous opinions. 

I know of nothing in our modern times which approaches 
so nearly to the; ancient oracle as the letter of a Presidential 
candidate. Now, among the Greeks, the eating of beans was 
strictly forbidden to all such as had it in mind to consult those 
expert amphibologists, and this same prohibition on the part 
o2 



84 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

of Pythagoras to his disciples is understood to imply an ab- 
stinence from politics, beans having been used as ballots. That 
other explication, quod videlicet sensus eo cibo obtundi existi- 
maret, though supported pugnis et calcibus by many of the 
learned, and not wanting the countenance of Cicero, is con- 
futed by the larger experience of New England. On the 
whole, I think it safer to apply here the rule of interpretation 
which now generally obtains in regard to antique cosmogonies, 
myths, fables, proverbial expressions, and knotty points gene- 
rally, which is, to find a common-sense meaning, and then 
select whatever can be imagined the most opposite thereto. 
In this way we arrive at the conclusion, that the Greeks ob- 
jected to the questioning of candidates. And very properly, 
if, as I conceive, the chief point be not to discover what a per- 
son in that position is, or what he will do, but whether he can 
be elected. Vos exemplaria Gnsca noctuma versate manu, ver- 
sate diuma. 

But, since an imitation of the Greeks in this particular (the 
asking of questions being one chief privilege of freemen) is 
hardly to be hoped for, and our candidates will answer, whether 
they are questioned or not, I would recommend that these 
ante-electionary dialogues should be carried on by symbols,- as 
were the diplomatic correspondences of the Scythians and 
Macrobii, or confined to the language of signs, like the famous 
interview of Panurge and Goatsnose. A candidate might then 
convey a suitable reply to all committees of inquiry by closing 
one eye, or by presenting them with a phial of Egyptian dark- 
ness to be speculated upon by their respective constituencies. 
These answers would be susceptible of whatever retrospective 
construction the exigencies of the political campaign might 
seem to demand, and the candidate could take his position on 
either side of the fence with entire consistency. Or, if letters 
must be written, profitable use might be made of the Dighton 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 85 

rock hieroglyphic or the cuneiform script, every fresh decipherer 
of which is enabled to educe a different meaning, whereby a 
sculptured stone or two supplies us, and will probably continue 
to supply posterity, with a very vast and various body of au- 
thentic history. Tor even the briefest epistle in the ordinary 
chirography is dangerous. There is scarce any style so com- 
pressed that superfluous words may not be detected in it. A 
severe critic might curtail that famous brevity of Caesar's by 
two thirds, drawing his pen through the supererogatory vent 
and vidi. Perhaps, after all, the surest footing of hope is to 
be found in the rapidly increasing tendency to demand less and 
less of qualification in candidates. Already have statesman- 
ship, experience, and the possession (nay, the profession, even) 
of principles been rejected as superfluous, and may not the 
patriot reasonably hope that the ability to write will follow ? 
At present, there may be death in pot-hooks as well as pots, 
the loop of a letter may suffice for a bow-string, and all the 
dreadful heresies of Anti-slavery may lurk in a flourish. — H.W. 



86 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 



No. VIII. 



A SECOND LETTER FROM B. SAWIN, ESQ. 

[In the following epistle, we behold Mr. Sawin returning a 
miles emeritus, to the bosom of his family. Quantum mutatus! 
The good Father of us all had doubtless entrusted to the keep- 
ing of this child of his certain faculties of a constructive kind. 
He had put in him a share of that vital force, the nicest eco- 
nomy of every minute atom of which is necessary to the perfect 
development of Humanity. He had given him a brain and 
heart, and so had equipped his soul with the two strong wings 
of knowledge and love, whereby it can mount to hang its nest 
under the eaves of heaven. And this child, so dowered, he 
had entrusted to the keeping of his vicar, the State. How 
stands the account of that stewardship ? The State, or So- 
ciety (call her by what name you will), had taken no manner 
of thought of him till she saw him swept out into the street, 
the pitiful leavings of last night's debauch, with cigar- ends, 
lemon-parings, tobacco-quids, slops, vile stenches, and the 
whole loathsome next-morning of the bar-room, — an own child 
of the Almighty God ! I remember him as he was brought to 
be christened, a ruddy, rugged babe ; and now there he wallows, 
reeking, seething, — the dead corpse, not of a man, but of a 
soul, — a putrefying lump, horrible for the life that is in it. 
Comes the wind of heaven, that good Samaritan, and parts the 
hair upon his forehead, nor is too nice to kiss those parched. 



THE BIGLOW PArERS. 87 

cracked lips ; the morning opens upon him her eves full of 
pitying sunshine, the sky yearns down to him, — and there he 
lies fermenting. sleep! let me not profane thy holy name 
by calling that stertorous unconsciousness a slumber ! By and 
by comes along the State, God's vicar. Does she say, — "My 
poor, forlorn foster-child ! Behold here a force which I will 
make dig and plant and build for me"? Not so, but, — "Here 
is a recruit ready-made to my hand, a piece of destroying 
energy lying unprofitably idle." So she claps an ugly grey 
suit on him, puts a musket in his grasp, and sends him off, 
with Gubernatorial and other godspeeds, to do duty as a 
destroyer. 

I made one of the crowd at the last Mechanics' Fair, and, 
with the rest, stood gazing in wonder at a perfect machine, 
with its soul of fire, its boiler-heart that sent the hot blood 
pulsing along the iron arteries, and its thews of steel. And 
while I was admiring the adaptation of means to end, the har- 
monious involutions of contrivance, and the never-bewildered 
complexity, I saw a grimed and greasy fellow, the imperious 
engine's lackey and drudge, whose sole office was to let fall, 
at intervals, a drop or two of oil upon a certain joint. Then 
my soul said wit Inn me, See there a piece of mechanism to 
^.vhich that other you marvel at is but as the rude first effort 
of a child, — a force which* not merely suffices to set a few 
wheels in motion, but which can send an impulse all through 
the infinite future, — a contrivance, not for turning out pins, 
or stitching button-holes, but for making Hamlets and Lears. 
And yet this thing of iron shall be housed, waited on, guarded 
from rust and dust, and it shall be a crime but so much as to 
scratch it with a pin; while the other, with its fire of God in 
it, shall be buffeted hither and tliither, and finally sent carefully 
a thousand miles to be the target for a Mexican cannon-ball. 
Unthrifty Mother State! My heart burned within me for pity 



88 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

and indignation, and I renewed this covenant with my own 
soul, — In aliis mansuetus ero, at, in blasphemiis contra Christum, 
non ita.—K. W.] 



I spose you wonder ware I be; I can't tell, fer the soul 

o' me, 
Exacly ware I be myself, — meanin' by thet the holl 

o' me. 
Wen I left hum, I hed two legs, an' they worn't bad 

ones neither 
(The scaliest trick they ever played wuz bringin' on me 

hither), 
Now one on 'em 's I dunno ware ; — they thought I wuz 

adyin', 
An' sawed it off, because they said 'twuz kin' o' mor- 

tifyin' ; 
I 'm willin' to believe it wuz, an' yit I don't see, nuther, 
Wy one should take to feelin' cheap a minnit sooner 'n 

t'other, 
Sence both wuz equilly to biame ; but things is ez 

they be ; 
It took on so they took it off, an' thet 's enough 

fer me : 
There 's one good thing, though, to be said about my 

wooden new one, — 
The liquor can't get into it ez 't used to in the true 

one ; 



THE BIGLOW TArERS. S9 

So it saves drink ; au' then, besides, a feller could n't 

beg 
A gretter blessin' then to hev one oilers sober peg ; 
It 's true a chap 's in want o' two fer follerin' a drum, 
But all the march I 'm up to now is jest to Kingdom 

Come. 

I 've lost one eye, but thet 's a loss it 's easy to supply 
Out o' the glory thet I Ve gut, fer thet is all my eye; 
An' one is big enough, I guess, by diligently usin' it, 
To see all I shall ever git by way o' pay fer losin' it ; 
Off 'cers, I notice, who git paid fer all our thumps an' 

kickins, 
Du wal by keepin' single eyes arter the fattest pickins; 
So, ez the eye 's put fairly out, I '11 lam to go without it, 
An' not allow myself to be no gret put out about it. 
Now, le' me see, thet is n't all ; I used, 'fore leavin' 

Jaalam, 
To count things on my finger-eends, but sutthin seems 

to ail 'em : 
Ware 's my left hand ? 0, darn it, yes, I recollect wut 's 

come on 't ; 
I haint no left arm but my right, an' thet's gut jest 

a thumb on 't ; 
It aint so hendy ez it wuz to cal'late a sum on 't. 
I ve hed some ribs broke, — six (I b'lieve), — I haint 

kep' no account on 'em ; 



90 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

Wen pensions git to be the talk, I '11 settle the amount 

on 'em. 
An' now I'm speakin' about ribs, it kin' o' brings to 

mind 
One thet I could n't never break, — the one I lef 

behind ; 
Ef you should see her, jest clear out the spout o' your 

invention 
An' pour the longest sweetnin' in about an annooal 

pension, 
An' kin' o' hint (in case, you know, the critter should 

refuse to be 
Consoled) I aint so 'xpensive now to keep ez wut I 

used to be ; 
There's one arm less, ditto one eye, an' then the leg 

thet 's wooden 
Can be took off an' sot away wenever ther' 's a puddin'. 

I spose you think I'm comin' back ez opperlunt ez 
thunder, 

With shiploads o' gold images, an' varus sorts o' plunder ; 

Wal, 'fore I vullinteered, I thought this country wuz a 
sort o' 

Canaan, a reg'lar Promised Land flowin' with rum an' 
water, 

Ware propaty growed up like time, without no culti- 
vation, 



THE BIG LOW TATERS. 91 

An' gold wuz dug ez taters be among our Yankee 

nation, 
Ware nateral advantages were pufficly amaziu', 
Ware every rock there wuz about with precious stuns 

wuz Mann', 
Ware mill-sites filled the country up ez thick ez you 

could cram 'em, 
An' desput rivers run about abeggin' folks to dam 'em ; 
Then there were meetinhouses, tu, chockful o' gold an' 

silver 
Thet you could take, an' no one could n't hand ye in 

no bill fer j — 
Thet 's wut I thought afore I went, thet 's wut them 

fellers told us 
Thet stayed to hum an' speechified an' to the buzzards 

sold us j 
I thought thet gold mines could be gut cheaper than 

china asters, 
An' see myself acomin' back like sixty Jacob Astors ; 
But sech idees soon melted down an' did n't leave a 

grease-spot ; 
I vow my holl sheer o' the spiles would n't come nigh 

a V spot j 
Although, most any wares we 've ben, you need n't 

break no locks, 
Xor run no kin' o' risks, to fill your pocket full o' 

rocks. 



92 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

I guess I mentioned in my last some o' the nateral 

feeturs 
0' this all-fiered buggy hole in th' way o' awfle cree- 

turs, 
But I fergut to name (new things to speak on so 

abounded) 
How one day you '11 most die o' thust, an' 'fore the 

next git drownded. 
The clymit seems to me jest like a teapot made o' 

pewter 
Our Prudence hed, thet would n't pour (all she could 

du) to suit her ; 
Fust place the leaves 'ould choke the spout, so 's not a 

drop 'ould dreen out, 
Then Prude 'ould tip an' tip an' tip, till the holl kit 

bust clean out, 
The kiver- hinge-pin bein' lost, tea-leaves an' tea an' 

kiver 
'ould all come down kerswosh ! ez though the dam broke 

in a river. 
Jest so 't is here ; holl months there aint a day o' rainy 

weather, 
An' jest ez th' officers 'ould be alayin' heads together 
Ez t' how they 'd mix their drink at sech a milingtary 

deepot, — 
'T 'ould pour ez though the lid wuz off the everlastin' 

teapot. 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 93 

The cons'quence is. thet I shall take, wen I 'm allowed 

to leave here, 
Que piece o' propaty along, — an' thet 's the shakin' 

fever ; 
It 's reggilar employment, though, an' thet aint thought 

to harm one, 
Xor 't aint so tiresome ez it wuz with t' other leg an' 

arm on ; 
An' it 's a consolation, tu, although it does n't pay, 
To hev it said you 're some gret shakes in any kin' o' 

way. 
T worn't veiy long, I tell ye wut, I thought o' fortin- 

makin', — 
One day a reg'lar shiver-de-freeze, an' next ez good ez 

bakin', — 
One day abrilin in the sand, then smoth'rin' in the 

mashes, — 
(rit up all sound, be put to bed a mess o' hacks an' 

smashes. 
But then, thinks I, at any rate there 's glory to be 

hed, — 
Thet 's an investment, arter all, thet may n't turn out 

so bad ; 
But somehow, wen we 'd fit an' licked, I oilers found 

the thauks 
Gut kin' o' lodged afore they come ez low down ez the 

ranks ; 



94 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

► 

The Gin'rals gut the biggest sheer, the Cunnles next, 

an' so on, — 
We never gut a blasted mite o' glory ez I know on ; 
An' spose we hed, I wonder how you 're goin' to con- 
trive its 
Division so 's to give a piece to twenty thousand 

privits; 
Ef you should multiply by ten the portion o' the brav'st 

one, 
You would n't git more 'n half enough to speak of on 

a grave-stun ; 
We git the licks, — we 're jest the grist thet 's put into 

War's hoppers ; 
Leftenants is the lowest grade thet helps pick up the 

coppers. 
It may suit folks thet go agin a body with a soul in 't, 
An' aint contented with a hide without a bagnet hole 

in't; 
But glory is a kin' o' thing / shan't pursue no furder, 
Coz thet 's the off'cers parquisite, — yourn 's on'y jest 

the murder. 

Wal, arter I gin glory up, thinks I at least there 's one 
Thing in the bills we aint hed yit, an' thet 's the glo- 
rious fun ; 
Ef once we git to Mexico, we fairly may persume we 
All day an' night shall revel in the halls o' Montezumy. 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 95 

I 11 tell ye wut my revels wuz, an' see how you would 

like 'em; 
We never gut inside the hall : the nighest ever / come 
Wua stan' in' sentry in the sun (an', fact, it seemed a 

cent'ry) 
A ketchin' smells o' biled an" roast thet come out thru 

the entry, 
An" hearin', ez I sweltered thru my passes an' repasses, 
A rat-tat-too o' knives an' forks, a clinkty-clink o' 

glasses : 
I caut tell off the bill o' fare the Gin'rals hed inside 
All I know is, thet out o' doors a pair o' soles wuz 

fried, 
An' not a hunderd miles away frum ware this child 

wuz posted, 
A Massachusetts citizen wuz baked an' biled an' roasted; 
The on'y thing like revellin' thet ever come to me 
Wuz bein' routed out o' sleep by thet darned revelee. 

They say the quarrel 's settled now ; fer my part I 've 

some doubt on 't, 
T 11 take more fish-skin than folks think to take the 

rile cleau out on 't; 
At any rate, I 'm so used up I can't do no more fightin', 
The on'y chance thet 's left to me is politics or writin' ; 
Now, ez the people 's gut to hev a milingtary man, 
An' I aint nothin' else jest now, I 've hit upon a plan ; 



96 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

The can'idatin' line, you know, 'ould suit me to a T, 
An' ef I lose, 't wunt hurt my ears to lodge another flea; 
So I '11 set up ez can'idate fer any kin' o' office 
(I mean fer any thet includes good easy-cheers an' 



Fer ez to runnin' fer a place ware work 's the time o' 

day, 
You know thet 's wut I never did, — except the other 

way); 
Ef it 's the Presidential cheer fer wich I 'd better run, 
Wut two legs anywares about could keep up with my 

one? 
There aint no kin' o' quality in can'idates, it 's said, 
So useful ez a wooden leg, — except a wooden head ; 
There 's nothin' aint so poppylar — (wy, it 's a parfect 

sin 
To think wut Mexico hez paid fer Santy Anny's pin;) — 
Then T haint gut no principles, an', sence I wuz knee- 
high, 
I never did hev any gret, ez you can testify; 
I 'm a decided peace-man, tu, an' go agin, the war, — 
Fer now the holl on 't 's gone an'- past, wut is there to 

go for ? 
Ef, wile you 're 'lectioneerin' round, some curus chaps 

should beg 
To know my views o' state affairs, jest answer wooden 
' leg! 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 97 

Ef they aint settisfied with thet, an' kin' o' pry an 1 

doubt 
An' ax for sutthiu' deffynit, jest say ONH eye put out ! 
Thet kin o' talk I guess you '11 find '11 answer to a 

charm, 
An' wen you 're druv tu nigh the wall, hoi' up my 

missin' arm; 
Ef they should nose roimd fer a pledge, put on a 

vartoous look 
An' tell 'em thet 's percisely wut I never gin nor — 

took! 

Then you can call me " Tirnbertoes," — thet 's wut the 
people likes ; 

Sutthiu' combinin morril truth with phrases sech ez 
strikes ; 

Some say the people 's fond o' this, or thet, or wut you 
please, — 

I tell ye wut the people want is jest correct idees; 

"Old Timbertoes" you *ee 's a creed it 's safe to be 
quite bold on, 

There 's nothin' in 't the other side can any ways git- 
hold on ; 

It 's a good tangible idee, a sutthiu' to embody 

Thet valooable class o' men who look thru brandy- 
toddy; 

It gives a Party Platform tu, jest level with the mind 

H 



98 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

Of all right-thinkin', honest folks thet mean to go it 

blind; 
Then there air other good hooraws to dror on ez yon 

need 'em, 
Sech ez the one-eyed Slarterer, the bloody Bjrdo- 

eredum; 
Them 's wut takes hold o' folks thet think, ez well ez 

o' the masses, 
An' makes yon sartin o' the aid o' good men of all 



There 's one thing I 'm in doubt about ; in order to be 

Presidunt, 
It 's absolutely ne'ssary to be a Southern residunt ; 
The Constitution settles thet, an' also thet a feller 
Must own a nigger o' some sort, jet black, or brown, or 

yeller. 
Now I haint no objections agin particklar climes, 
Nor agin ownin' anythin' (except the truth sometimes), 
But, ez I haint no capital, up there among ye, may be, 
You might raise funds enough fer me to buy a low- 
priced baby, 
An' then, to suit the No'thern folks, who feel obleeged 

to say 
They hate an' cuss the very thing they vote fer every 

day, 
Say you 're assured I go full butt fer Libbaty's diffusion 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 99 

An' made the purchis oily jest to spite the Institoo- 

tioa ; — 
But, golly ! there 's the currier's hoss upon the pavement 

pawiu 1 ! 
I '11 be more 'xplicit in my next. 
Yourn, 

BIRDOFREDUM SAWTO. 

[We have now a tolerably fair chance of estimating how the 
balance-sheet stands between our returned volunteer and glory. 
Supposing the entries to be set down on both sides of the account 
in fractional parts of one hundred, we shall arrive at some- 
thing like the following result : — 
Or. B. Sawih, Esq., in account with (Blank) Glory. Dr. 



By loss of 


one leg . . . 20 


To one 675th three cheers 


„ do. 


one arm . . 15 


in Faneuil Hall ... 30 


„ do. 


four fingers . 5 


„ do. do. on oc- 


„ do. 


one eye . .10 


casion of presentation of 


,, the breaking of six ribs 6 


swordto Colonel Wright 25 


.. having 


served under 


„ one suit of grey clothes 


Colonel 


Cushing one 


(ingeniously unbecom- 


month 


44 


ing) 15 

„ musical entertainments 
(drum and fife six 

months) 

„ one dinner after return 1 
„ chance of pension . . 1 
„ privilege of drawing 
longbow during rest of 
natural life . . . .23 


E. E. 


100 


100 




H 


2 



100 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

It would appear that Mr. Sawin found the actual feast 
curiously the reverse of the bill of fare advertised in Eaneuil 
Hall and other places. His primary object seems to have 
been the making of his fortune. Qucerenda pecunia primum, 
virtus post nummos. He hoisted sail for Eldorado, and ship- 
wrecked on Point Tribulation. Quid non mortalia pectora 
cogis, aim sacra fames ? The speculation has sometimes 
crossed my mind, in that dreary interval of drought which 
intervenes between quarterly stipendiary showers, that Provi- 
dence, by the creation of a money-tree, might have simplified 
wonderfully the sometimes perplexing problem of human life. 
We read of bread-trees, the butter for which lies ready- 
churned in Irish bogs. Milk-trees we are assured of in South 
America, and stout Sir John Hawkins testifies to water-trees 
in the Canaries. Boot-trees bear abundantly in Lynn and 
elsewhere ; and I have seen, in the entries of the wealthy, hat- 
trees with a fair show of fruit. A family-tree I once culti- 
vated myself, and found therefrom but a scanty yield, and that 
quite tasteless and innutritious. Of trees bearing men we are 
not without examples ; as those in the park of Louis the 
Eleventh of Erance. Who has forgotten, moreover, that 
olive-tree growing in the Athenian's back-garden, with its 
strange uxorious crop, for the general propagation of which, 
as of a new and precious variety, the philosopher Diogenes, 
hitherto uninterested in arboriculture, was so zealous ? In 
the sylva of our own Southern States, the females of my family 
have called my attention to the china-tree. Not to multiply 
examples, I will barely add to my list the birch-tree, in the 
smaller branches of which has been implanted so miraculous 
a virtue for communicating the Latin and Greek languages, 
and which may well therefore be classed among the trees 
producing necessaries of life, — venerabile donum fatalis virga. 
That money-trees existed in the golden age there want not 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 101 

prevalent reasons for onr believing, For does not the old 
proverb, when it asserts that money does not grow on every 
bush, imply a fortiori, that there were certain bushes which 
did produce it ? Again, there is another ancient saw to the 
effect that money is the root of all evil. From which two 
adages it may be safe to infer that the aforesaid species of tree 
first degenerated into a shrub, then absconded underground, 
and finally, in our iron age, vanished altogether. In favourable 
exposures it may be conjectured that a specimen or two sur- 
vived to a great age, as in the garden of the Hesperides ; and, 
indeed, what else could that tree in the Sixth iEneid have 
been, with a branch whereof the Trojan hero procured ad- 
mission to a territory, for the entering of which money is a 
surer passport than to a certain other more profitable (too) 
foreign kingdom ? Whether these speculations of mine have 
any force in them, or whether they will not rather, by most 
readers, be deemed impertinent to the matter in hand, is a 
question which I leave to the determination of an indulgent 
posterity. That there were, in more primitive and happier 
times, shops where money was sold, — and that, too, on credit 
and at a bargain, — I take to be matter of demonstration. For 
what but a dealer in this article was that iEolus who supplied 
Ulysses with motive power for his fleet in bags ? What that 
Ericus, king of Sweden, who is said to have kept the winds in 
his cap ? "What, in more recent times, those Lapland Nomas 
who traded in favourable breezes? All which will appear the 
more clearly when we consider, that, even to this day, raising 
rind is proverbial for raising money, and that brokers and 
banks were invented by the Venetians at a later period. 

And now for the improvement of this digression. I find a 
parallel to Mr. Sawin's fortune in an adventure of my own. 
For, shortly after I had first broached to myself the before- 
stated natural-historical and archaeological theories, as I was 



102 THE BIGLGW PAPEKS. 

passing, hmc negotia penitus mecum revolvens, through one 
of the obscure suburbs of our New England metropolis, my 
eye was attracted by these words upon a sign-board, — Cheap 
Cash-Store. Here was at once the confirmation of my specu- 
lations, and the substance of my hopes. Here lingered the 
fragment of a happier past, or stretched out the first tremulous 
organic filament of a more fortunate future. Thus glowed the 
distant Mexico to the eyes of Sawin, as he looked through the 
dirty pane of the recruiting-office window, or speculated from 
the summit of that mirage-Pisgah which the imps of the bottle 
are so cunning in raising up. Already had my Alnaschar-fancy 
(even during that first half-believing glance) expended in va- 
rious useful directions the funds to be obtained by pledging 
the manuscript of a proposed volume of discourses. Already 
did a clock ornament the tower of the Jaalam meeting-house— 
a gift appropriately, but modestly, commemorated in the parish 
and town records, both, for now many years, kept by myself. 
Already had my son Seneca completed his course at the Uni- 
versity. Whether, for the moment, we may not be considered 
as actually lording it over those Baratarias with the viceroyalty 
of which Hope invests us, and whether we are ever so warmly 
housed as in our Spanish castles, would afford matter of argu- 
ment. Enough that I found that sign-board to be no other 
than a bait to the trap of a decayed grocer. Nevertheless, I 
bought a pound of dates (getting short weight by reason of 
immense flights of harpy flies, who pursued and lighted upon 
their prey even in the very scales), which purchase I made, 
not only with an eye to the little ones at home, but also as a 
figurative reproof of that too-frequent habit of my mind, which, 
forgetting the due order of chronology, will often persuade me 
that the happy sceptre of Saturn is stretched over this Astrsea- 
forsaken nineteenth century. 

Having glanced at the ledger of Glory under the title 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 103 

Saici;/, B., let us extend our investigations, and discover if that 
instructive volume does not contain some charges more per- 
sonally interesting to ourselves. I think we should be more 
economical of our resources, did we thoroughly appreciate the 
fact, that, whenever Brother Jonathan seems to be thrusting 
his hand into his own pocket, he is, in fact, picking ours. I 
confess that the late muck which the country has been running, 
has materially changed my views as to the best method of 
raising revenue. If, by means of direct taxation, the bills for 
every extraordinary outlay were brought under our immediate 
eye, so that, like thrifty housekeepers, we could see where aud 
how fast the money was going, we should be less likely to 
commit extravagances. At present, these things are managed 
in such a hugger-mugger way, that we know not what we pay 
for ; the poor man is charged as much as the rich ; and, while 
we are saving aud scrimping at the spigot, the government is 
drawiug off at the bung. If we could know that a part of the 
money we expend for tea and coffee goes to buy powder and 
ball, and that it is Mexican blood which makes the clothes on 
our backs more costly, it would set some of us athinking. 
During the present fall, I have often pictured to myself a 
government official entering my study, and handing me the 
following bill :— 

Washington, Sept. 30, 1848. 

Rev. Homer Wilbur to Hntlt Samuel, Br. 

To his share of work done in Mexico on partnership 
account, sundry jobs, as below. 

„ killing, maiming, and wounding about 5,000 Mexi- 
cans $2.00 

„ slaughtering one woman carrying water to wounded .10 



104 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

To extra work on two different Sabbaths (one bombard- 
ment and one assault) whereby the Mexicans 
were prevented from defiling themselves with 

the idolatries of high mass $3.50 

„ throwing an especially fortunate and Protestant 
bomb-shell into the Cathedral at Vera Cruz, 
whereby several female Papists were slain at 

the altar 50 

„ his proportion of cash paid for conquered territory 1.75 
„ do. do. for conquering do. . 1.50 

„ manuring do. with new superior compost called 

" American Citizen " 50 

„ extending the area of freedom and Protestantism . .01 
» glory 01 

$9.87 
is 



N.B. Thankful for former favours, U. S. requests a con- 
tinuance of patronage. Orders executed with neatness and 
despatch. Terms as low as those of any other contractor for 
the same kind and style of work. 

I can fancy the official answering my look of horror with, — 
" Yes, Sir, it looks like a high charge, Sir ; but in these days 
slaughtering is slaughtering." Verily, I would that every one 
understood that it was; for it goes about obtaining money 
under the false pretence of being glory. For me, I have an 
imagination which plays me uncomfortable tricks. It happens 
to me sometimes to see a slaughterer on his way home from 
his day's work, and forthwith my imagination puts a cocked- 
hat upon his head, and epaulettes upon his shoulders, and sets 
him up as a candidate for the Presidency. So, also, on a 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 105 

recent public occasion, as the place assigned to the "Reverend 
Clergy" is just behind that of "Officers of the Army and 
Navy " in processions, it was my fortune to be seated at the 
dinner-table over against one of these respectable persons. 
He was arrayed as (out of his own profession) only kings, 
court-officers, and footmen are in Europe, and Indians in Ame- 
rica. Xow what does my over-officious imagination but set to 
work upon him, strip him of his gay livery, and present him 
to me coatlcss, his trousers thrust into the tops of a pair of 
boots thick with clotted blood, and a basket on his arm out of 
which lolled a gore- smeared axe, thereby destroying my relish 
for the temporal mercies upon the board before me. — H. TV*.] 



106 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 



No. IX. 

A THIRD LETTER EROM B. SAWIN, ESQ. 

[Upon the following letter slender comment will be needful. 
In what river Selemnus has Mr. Sawin bathed, that he has 
become so swiftly oblivions of his former loves? Erom an 
ardent and (as befits a soldier) confident wooer of that coy 
bride, the popular favour, we see him subside of a sudden into 
the (I trust not jilted) Cincinnatus, returning to his plough 
with a goodly-sized branch of willow in his hand ; figuratively 
returning, however, to a figurative plough, and from no profound 
affection for that honoured implement of husbandry (for which, 
indeed, Mr. Sawin never displayed any decided predilection), 
but in order to be gracefully summoned therefrom to more 
congenial labours. It would seem that the character of the 
ancient Dictator had become part of the recognised stock of 
our modern political comedy, though, as our term of office 
extends to a quadrennial length, the parallel is not so minutely 
exact as could be desired. It is sufficiently so, however, for 
purposes of scenic representation. An humble cottage (if 
built of logs, the better) forms the Arcadian background of the 
stage. This rustic paradise is labeled Ashland, Jaalam, North 
Bend, Marshfield, Kinderhook, or Baton Rouge, as occasion 
demands. Before the door stands a something with one handle 
(the other painted in proper perspective), which represents, in 
happy ideal vagueness, the plough. To this the defeated can- 
didate rushes with delirious joy, welcomed as a father by 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 107 

appropriate groups of happy labourers, or from it the success- 
ful oue is toru with difficulty, sustained alone by a noble sense 
of public duty. Only I have observed, that, if the scene be 
laid at Baton Rouge or Ashland, the labourers are kept care- 
fully iu the background, and are heard to shout from behind 
the scenes in a singular tone, resembling ululation, and accom- 
panied by a sound not unlike vigorous clapping. This, how- 
ever, may be artistically in keeping with the habits of the rustic 
population of those localities. The precise connexion between 
agricultural pursuits and statesmanship I have not been able, 
after diligent inquiry, to discover. But, that my investigations 
may not be barren of all fruit, I will mention one curious sta- 
tistical fact, which I consider thoroughly established, namely, 
that no real farmer ever attains practically beyond a seat in 
General Court, however theoretically qualified for more exalted 
station. 

It is probable that some other prospect has been opened to 
Mr. Sawin, and that he has not made this great sacrifice with- 
out some definite understanding in regard to a seat in the 
cabinet, or a foreign mission. It may be supposed that we of 
Jaalam were not untouched by a feeling of villatic pride in 
beholding our townsman occupying so large a space in the 
public eye. And to me, deeply revolving the qualifications 
necessary to a candidate in these frugal times, those of Mr. S. 
seemed peculiarly adapted to a successful campaign. The loss 
of a leg, an arm, an eye, and four fingers, reduced him so 
nearly to the condition of a vox et praterea nihil, that I could 
think of nothing but the loss of his head by which his chance 
could have been bettered. But since he has chosen to baulk 
our suffrages, we must content ourselves with what we can 
get, remembering lactucas non esse dafidas, dum cardui suffi- 
— H. W.] 



108 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

I spose you recollect thet I explained my gennle 

views 
In the last billet thet I writ, 'way down frum Yeery 

Cruze, 
Jest arter I'da kind o' ben spontanously sot up 
To run unanimously fer the Presidential cup ; 
0' course it worn't no wish o' mine, 't wuz ferflely dis- 
tressing 
But poppiler enthusiasm gut so almighty pressin' 
Thet, though like sixty all along I fumed an' fussed 

an' sorrered, 
There did n't seem no ways to stop their briugin' on 

me forrerd : 
Fact is, they udged the matter so, I could n't help ad- 

mittin' 
The Father o' his Country's shoes no feet but mine 

'ould fit in, 
Besides the savin' o' the soles fer ages to succeed, 
Seem' thet with one wannut foot, a pair 'd be more 'n 

I need ; 
An 1 , tell ye wut, them shoes '11 want a thund'rin' sight 

o' patchin', 
Ef this ere fashion is to last we've gut into o' 

hatchin' 
A pair o' second Washintons fer every new election, — 
Though, fur ez number one 's consarned, I don't make 

no objection. 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 100 

I wui agoin' on to say thet wen at fust I saw 

The masses would stick to 't I wuz the Country's 

father-'n-law 
(They would ha' hed it Father, but I told 'em 't would 

n't du, 
Coz thet wuz sutthin' of a sort they could n't split 

in tu, 
An' "Washinton hed hed the thing laid fairly to his 

door, 
Nor dars n't say 't worn't his'n, much ez sixty year 

afore), 
But 't aint no matter ez to thet ; wen I wuz nomer- 

nated, 
*T worn't natur but wut I should feel consid'able 

elated, 
An' wile the hooraw o' the thing wuz kind o' noo an' 

fresh, 
I thought our ticket would ha' caird the country with 

a resh. 

Seuce I 've come hum, though, an' looked round, I 

think I seem to find 
Strong argimunts ez thick ez fleas to make me change 

my mind ; 
It's clear to any one whose brain ain't fur gone in a 

. phthisis, 
Thet hail Columby's happy land is goin' thru a crisis, 



110 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

An' 't would n't noways du to hev the people's mind 

distracted 
By bein' all to once by sev'ral pop'lar names attackted ; 
'T would save holl hay cartloads o' fuss an' three four 

months o' jaw, 
Ef some illustrous paytriot should back out an' with- 
draw; 
So, ez I aint a crooked stick, jest like — like ole (I 

swow, 
I dunno ez I know his name) — I'll go back to my 

plough. 
Now, 't aint no more 'n is proper 'n' right in sech a 

sitooation 
To hint the course you think '11 be the savin' o' the 

nation ; 
To funk right out o' p'lit'cal strife aint thought to be 

the thing,. 
Without you deacon off the toon you want your folks 

should sing ; 
So I edvise the noomrous friends thet 's in one boat 

with me 
To jest up killock, jam right down their helium hard 

a lee, 
Haul the sheets taut, an', laying out upon the Suthun 

tack, 
Make fer the safest port they can, wich, / think, is 
OleZaek. 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. Ill 

Next thing you '11 want to know, I spose, wut argimunts 

I seem 
To see tbet makes me think this ere '11 be the strongest 

team ; 
Fust place, I 've ben consicTble round in bar-rooms an' 

saloons 
Agethrin' public sentiment, 'mongst Demmercrats and 

Coons, 
An' 't aint ve'y offen tbet I meet a chap but wut 

goes in 
Fer Rough an Ready, fair an' square, hufs, taller, 

horns, an' skin ; 
I don't deny but wut, fer one, ez fur ez I could see, 
I didn't like at fust the Pheladelphy nomernee ; 
I could ha' pinted to a man tbet wuz, I guess, a peg 
Higher than him, — a soger, tu, an' with a wooden leg ; 
But every day with more an' more o' Taylor zeal I 'm 

burnin', 
Seein' wich way the tide tbet sets to office is aturnin' ; 
Wy, into Bellers's we notched the votes down on three 

sticks, — 
'T wuz Birdofredum one, Cass aught, an' Taylor twenty- 

An', bein' the on'y candcrdate tbet wuz upon the 

ground, 
They said 't wuz no more 'n right tbet I should pay 

the drinks all round , 



112 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

Ef I 'd expected sech a trick, I would n't ha' cut my 

foot 
By goin' an' votin' fer myself like a consumed coot ; 
It didn't make no diff'rence, though; I wish I may 

be cust, 
Ef Bellers wuz n't slim enough to say he would n't 

trust ! 

Another pint thet influences the minds o' sober jedges 
Is thet the Gin'ral hez n't gut tied hand an' foot with 

pledges ; 
He hez n't told ye wut he is, an' so there aint no 

knowin' 
But wut he may turn out to be the best there is agoin' ; 
This, at the on'y spot thet pinched, the shoe directly 



Coz every one is free to 'xpect percisely wut he pleases : 
I want free-trade ; you don't ; the Gin'ral is n't bound 

to neither ; — 
I vote my way ; you, yourn ; an' both air sooted to a 

T there. 
Ole Rough an' Ready, tu, 's a Wig, but without bein' 

ultry 
(He 's like a holsome hayinday, thet 's warm, but is n't 

sultry); 
He's jest wut I should call myself, a kin' o' scratch, ez 

't ware, 



THE BIGLOW PAPKRa 113 

Thet aint exacly all a wig nor wholly your own hair ; 
I 've ben a Wig three weeks myself, jest o' this mod'rate 

sort, 
An' don't find them an' Demmercrats so different ez I 

thought ; 
They both act pooty much alike, an' push an' scrouge 

an' cus ; 
They 're like two pickpockets in league fer Uncle Sam- 
well's pus ; 
Each takes a side, an' then they squeeze the old man 

in between 'em, 
Turn all his pockets wrong side out an' quick ez light- 

nin' clean 'em ; 
To nary one on 'em I 'd trust a secon'-handed rail 
No furder off 'an I could sling a bullock by the tail. 
Webster sot matters right in that air Mashfiel' speech 

o' his'n ; — 
" Taylor," sez he, " aint nary ways the one thet I 'd a 

chizzen, 
Nor he ain't fittin' fer the place, an' like ez not he aint 
No more 'n a tough ole bullethead, an' no gret of a 

saint; 
But then," sez he, " obsarve my pint, he's jest ez good 

to vote fer 
Ez though the greasin' on him wornt a thing to hire 

Choate fer ; 
Aint it ez easy done to drop a ballot in a box 
I 



114 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

Fer one ez 't is fer t' other, fer the bulldog ez the 

fox?" 
It takes a mind like Dannel's, fact, ez big ez all ou' 

doors, 
To find out thet it looks like rain arter it fairly 

pours ; 
I 'gree with him, it aint so dreffle troublesome to vote 
Fer Taylor arter all, — it 's jest to go an' change your 

coat; 
Wen he 's once greased, you '11 swaller him an' never 

know on 't, source, 
Unless he scratches, goin' down, with them air Gin'ral's 

spurs. 
I 've ben a votin' Demmercrat, ez reg'lar ez a clock, 
But don't find goin' Taylor gives my narves no gret J f 

a shock ; 
Truth is, the cutest leadin' Wigs, ever sence fust they 

found 
Wich side the bread gut buttered on, hev kep' a edgin' 

round ; 
They kin' o' slipt the planks frum out th' ole platform 

one by one 
An' made it gradooally noo, 'fore folks know'd wut 

wuz done, 
Till, fur 'z I know, there aint an inch thet I could lay 

my han' on, 
But I, or any Demmercrat, feels comf'table to stan' on, 






THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 115 

An' ole Wig doctrines act'lly look, their occ'pants bein' 
gone, 

Lonesome ez staddles on a mash without no hay- 
ricks on. 

I spose it 's time now I should give my thoughts upon 

the plan, 
Thet chipped the shell at Buffalo, o' settin' up ole Van. 
I used to vote fer Martin, but, I swan, I 'm clean dis- 
gusted, — 
He aint the man thet I can say is fittin' to be trusted ; 
He aint half antislav'ry 'nough, nor I aint sure, ez 

some be, 
He 'd go in fer abolishin the Deestrick o' Columby ; 
An', now I come to recollect, it kin' o' makes me sick 'z 
A horse, to think o' wut he wuz in eighteen thirty-six. 
An' then, another thing ; — I guess, though mebby I am 

wrong, 
This Buff'lo plaster aint agoin' to dror almighty 

strong ; 
Some folks, I know, hev gut th' idee thet No'thun 

dough '11 rise, 
Though, 'fore I see it riz an' baked, I would n't trust 

my eyes ; 
T will take more emptins, a long chalk, than this noo 

party 's gut, 
To give sech heavy cakes ez them a start, I tell ye wut. 
i 2 



116 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

But even ef they caird the day, there would n't be no 

endurin' 
To stand upon a platform with sech critters ez Van 

Buren ; — 
An' his son John, tu, I can't think how thet air chap 

should dare 
To speak ez he doos ; wy, they say he used to cuss an' 

swear ! 
I spose he never read the hymn thet tells how down 

the stairs 
A feller with long legs wuz throwed thet would n't say 

his prayers. 

This brings me to another pint : the leaders o' the 

party 
Aint jest sech men ez I can act along with free an' 

hearty ; 
They aint not quite respectable, an' wen a feller's 

morrils 
Don't toe the straightest kin' o' mark, wy, him an' me 

jest quarrils. 
I went to a free soil meetin' once, an' wut d' ye think 

I see? 
A feller wuz aspoutin' there thet act'lly come to me, 
About two year ago last spring, ez nigh ez I can jedge, 
An' axed me ef I didn't want to sign the Temprunce 

pledge ! 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 117 

He 's one o' them thet goes about an' sez you bed n't 
ougb' to 

Drink nothin', mornin', noon, or night, stronger 'an 
Taunton water. 

There's one rule I've ben guided by, in settlin' bow 
to vote, oilers, — 

I take the side thet is n't took by them consarned tee- 
totallers. 

Ez fer the niggers, I 've been South, an' thet hez changed 

my mind ; 
A lazier, more ungrateful set you could n't nowers 

find. 
You know I mentioned in my last thet I should buy a 

nigger, 
Ef I could make a purchase at a pooty mod'rate figger ; 
So. ez there 's nothin' in the world I 'm fonder of 'an 

gunnin', 
I closed a bargin finally to take a feller runnin'. 
I shou'dered queen's-arm an' stumped out, an' wen I 

come t' th' swamp, 
' T worn't very long afore I gut upon the nest o' Pomp ; 
I come acrost a kin' o' hut, an', playin' round the door, 
Some little woolly-headed cubs, ez many 'z six or more. 
At fust I thought o' firin', but think tivice is safest oilers ; 
There aint, thinks I, not one on em' but 's wuth his 

twenty dollars, 



118 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

Or would be, ef I hed 'em back into a Christian land, — 
How temptin' all on 'em would look upon an auction- 
stand ! 
(Not but wut / hate Slavery in th' abstract, stem to 

starn, — 
I leave it ware our fathers did, a privit State consarn.) 
Soon 'z they see me, they yelled an' run, but Pomp 

wuz out ahoein' 
A leetle patch o' corn he hed, or else there aint no 

knowin' 
He would n't ha' took a pop at me ; but I hed gut the 

start, 
An' wen he looked, I vow he groaned ez though he'd 

broke his heart ; 
He done it like a wite man, tu, ez nat'ral ez a pictur, 
The imp'dunt, pis'nous hypocrite ! wus 'an a boy con- 

strictur. 
" You can 't gum me, I tell ye now, an' so you need n't 

try, 
I 'xpect my eye-teeth every mail, so jest shet up," 

sez I. 
" Don't go to actin 1 ugly now, or else I '11 jest let strip, 
You 'd best draw kindly, seein' 'z how I 've gut ye on 

the hip ; 
Besides, you darned ole fool, it aint no gret of a 

disaster 
To be benev'lently druv back to a contented master, 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 119 

Ware you bed Christian priv'ledges you don't seem 

quite aware of, 
Or you 'd ha' never run away from bein' well took 

care of; 
Ez for kin' treatment, wy, he wuz so fond on ye, he 

said 
He 'd give a fifty spot right out, to git ye, 'live or 

dead ; 
Wite folks aint sot by half ez much ; 'member I run 

away, 
Wen I wuz bound to Cap'n Jakes, to Mattysqumscot 

bay; 
Don' know him, likely 1 Spose not j wal, the mean ole 

codger went 
An' offered — wut reward, think ? Wal, it worn't no 
n a cent." 

Wal, I jest gut 'em into line, an druv 'em on afore me, 
The pis'nous brutes, I 'd no idee o' the ill-will they 

bore me ; 
We walked till som'er3 about noon, an' then it grew 

so hot 
I thought it best to camp awile, so I chose out a spot 
Jest under a magnoly tree, an' there right down I sot ; 
Then I unstrapped my wooden leg, coz it begun to 

chafe, 
An" laid it down jest by my side, supposin' all wuz safe ; 



120 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

I made my darkies all set down around me in a ring, 
An' sot an' kin' o' ciphered np how much the lot 

would bring ; 
But, wile I drinked the peaceful cup of a pure heart 

an' mind 
(Mixed with some wiskey, now an' then), Pomp he 

snaked up behind, 
An', creepin' grad'lly close tu, ez quiet ez a mink, 
Jest grabbed my leg, and then pulled foot, quicker 'an 

you could wink, 
An', come to look, they each on 'em hed gut behin' a 

tree, 
An' Pomp poked out the leg a piece, jest so ez I could 

see, 
An' yelled to me to throw away my pistils an' my 

gun, 
Or else thet they 'd cair off the leg an' fairly cut the 

run. 
I vow I did n't b'lieve there wuz a decent alligatur 
Thet hed a heart so destitoot o' common human natur ; 
However, ez there worn't no help, I finally gev in 
An' heft my arms away to git my leg safe back agin. 
Pomp gethered all the weapins up, an' then he come 

an' grinned, 
He showed his ivory some, I guess, an' sez, "You 're 

fairly pinned ; 
Jest buckle on your leg agin, an' git right up an' come, 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 121 

'T wuut du fer fammerly men like me to be so long 

from hum." 
At fust I put my foot right down an' swore I would n't 

budge. 
u Jest ez you choose," sez he, quite cool, " either be 

shot or trudge." 
So this black-hearted monster took an' act'lly druv me 

back 
Along the very feetmarks o' my happy ruomin' track, 
An" kep' me prisoner 'bout six months, an' worked me, 

tu, like sin, 
Till I hed gut his corn an' his Carliny taters in ; 
He made me larn him readin', tu (although the crittur 

saw 
How much it hurt my morril sense to act agin the 

law), 
So 'st he could read a Bible he 'd gut ; an' axed ef I 

could pint 
The Xorth Star out ; but there I put his nose some 

out o' jint, 
Fer I weeled roun' about sou'west, an', lookin' up a 

bit, 
Picked out a middlin' shiny one an' tole him thet 

wuz it. 
Fin'lly, he took me to the door, an', givin' me a kick, 
Sez. — " Ef you know wut 's best fer ye, be off, now, 

double-quick ; 



122 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

The winter-time 's a comin' on, an', though I gut ye 

cheap, 
You 're so darned lazy, I don't think you 're hardly 

wuth your keep ; 
Besides, the childrin's growin' up, an' you aint jest the 

model 
I 'd like to hev 'em immertate, an' so you 'd better 

toddle ! " 

Now is there any thin' on airth '11 ever prove to me 
Thet renegader slaves like him air fit fer bein' free ? 
D' you think they '11 suck me in to jine the Buff'lo 

chaps, an' them 
Rank infidels thet go agin the Scriptur'l cus o' Shem ? 
Not by a jugfull ! sooner 'n thet, I 'd go thru fire an' 

water ; 
Wen I hev once made up my mind, a meet'nhus aint 

sotter ; 
No, not though all the crows thet flies to pick my bones 

wuz cawin', — 
I guess we 're in a Christian land, — 
Yourn, 

BIRDOFREDUM SAWIN. 



[Here, patient reader, we take leave of each other, I trust 
with some mutual satisfaction. I say patient, for I love not 
that kind which skims dippingly over the surface of the page, 
as swallows over a pool before rain. By such no pearls shall 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 123 

be gathered. But if no pearls there be (as, indeed, the world 

is not without example of books where from ihe longest- 
winded diver shall bring up no more than his proper handful 
of mud), yet let us hope that an oyster or two may reward 
adequate perseverance. If neither pearls nor oysters, yet is 
patience itself a gem worth diving deeply for. 

It may seem to some that too much space has been usurped 
by my own private lucubrations, aud some may be fain to 
bring against me that old jest of him who preached all his 
hearers out of the meeting-house save only the sexton, who, 
remaining for yet a little space, from a sense of official duty, at 
last gave out also, and, presenting the keys, humbly requested 
our preacher to lock the doors, when he should have wholly 
relieved himself of his testimony. I confess to a satisfaction 
in the self act of preaching, nor do I esteem a discourse to be 
wholly thrown away even upon a sleeping or unintelligent 
auditory. I cannot easily believe that the Gospel of St. John, 
which Jacques Cartier ordered to be read in the Latin tongue 
to the Canadian savages, upon his first meeting with them, 
fell altogether upon stony ground. For the earnestness of the 
preacher is a sermon appreciable by dullest intellects and most 
alien ears. In this wise did Episcopius convert many to his 
opinions, who yet understood not the language in which he 
discoursed. The chief thing is, that the messenger believe 
that he has an authentic message to deliver. For counterfeit 
messengers that mode of treatment which Father John de 
Piano Carpini relates to have prevailed among the Tartars 
would seem effectual, and, perhaps, deserved enough. For 
my own part, I may lay claim to so much of the spirit of 
martyrdom as would have led me to go into banishment with 
tliosc clergymen whom Alphonso the Sixth of Portugal drave 
out of his kingdom for refusing to shorten their pulpit elo- 
quence. It is possible, that, having been invited into my 



124 THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 

brother Biglow's desk, I may have been too little scrupulous 
in using it for the venting of my own peculiar doctrines to a 
congregation drawn together in the expectation and with the 
desire of hearing him. . 

I am not wholly unconscious of a peculiarity of mental or- 
ganization which impels me, like the railroad-engine with its 
train of cars, to run backward for a short distance in order 
to obtain a fairer start. I may compare myself to one fishing 
from the rocks when the sea runs high, who, misinterpreting 
the suction of the undertow for the biting of some larger fish, 
jerks suddenly, and finds that he has caught bottom, hauling 
in upon the end of his line a trail of various alga, among 
which, nevertheless, the naturalist may haply find somewhat 
to repay the disappointment of the angler. Yet have I con- 
scientiously endeavoured to adapt myself to the impatient 
temper of the age, daily degenerating more and more from the 
high standard of our pristine New England. To the cata- 
logue of lost arts I would mournfully add also that of listening 
to two-hour sermons. Surely we have been abridged into a 
race of pigmies. For, truly, in those of the old discourses 
yet subsisting to us in print, the endless spinal column of 
divisions and subdivisions can be likened to nothing so exactly 
as to the vertebrae of the saurians, whence the theorist may 
conjecture a race of Anakim proportionate to the withstanding 
of these other monsters. I say Anakim rather than Nephe- 
lim, because there seem reasons for supposing that the race 
of those whose heads (though no giants) are constantly en- 
veloped in clouds (which that name imports) will never be- 
come extinct. The attempt to vanquish the innumerable 
heads of one of those aforementioned discourses may supply 
us with a plausible interpretation of the second labour of Her- 
cules, and his successful experiment with fire affords us a 
useful precedent. 



THE BIGLOW PAPERS. 125 

But while I lament the degeneracy of the age in this regard, 
I cannot refuse to succumb to its influence. Looking out 
through my study-window, I see Mr. Biglow at a distance 
busy in gathering his Baldwins, of which, to judge by the 
number of barrels lying about under the trees, his crop is 
more abundant than my own, — by which sight I am admo- 
nished to turn to those orchards of the mind wherein my 
labours may be more prospered, and apply myself diligently to 
the preparation of my next Sabbath's discourse. — H. W.] 






G L S S A E Y. 



Act'lly. actually. 
Air, are. 
Airth, earth. 
Airy, area. 
Aree. area. 
Arter, after. 
Ax. ask. 

B. 

Beller, bellow. 

Bellowses, lunge. 

Ben, been. 

Bile, 601/. 

Bimeby, by and by. 

Blurt out, to speak bluntly. 

Buster, a roistering blade : used also 
as a general superlative. 

C. 

Caird, carried. 

Cairn, carrying. 

Caleb, a turncoat. 

Cal'late, calculate. 

Cass, a person witli two lives. 

Close, clothes. 

Cockerel, a young cock. 

Cocktail, a kind of drink ; also, an 
ornament peculiar to soldiers. 

Convention, a place where people are 
imposed on ; a juggler's show. , 

Coons, a cant term for a now defunct 
party ; derived, perhaps, from the 
fact of their being commonly up 
a tree. 

Coruwailn, a sort of muster in mas- 
querade ; supposed to have had 
its origin soon after the Revolu- 
tion, and to commemorate the 
surrender of Lord Cornwallis. It 
took the pla?e of the old Guy 
Fawkes procession. 



Crooked stick, a perverse, froward 

person. 
Cunnle, a colonel. 
Cus, a curse; also, a pitiful fellow. 



Darsn't. used indiscriminately, either 
in singular or plural number, for 
dare not, dares not, and darrd not. 

Deacon off, to give the cue to • de- 
rived from a custom, once univer- 
sal, but now extinct, in our New- 
England Congregational churches. 
An important part of the office of 
deacon was to read aloud the 
hymns given out by the minister, 
one line at a time, the congrega- 
tion singing each line as soon as 
read. 

Demmercrat, leadin', one in favour 
of extending slaveri/ ; a free-trade 
lecturer maintained in the custom- 
house. 

Desput, desperate. 

Doos. does. 

Doughface, a contented lick-spittle; 
a common variety of Northern po- 
litician. 

Dror, draw. 

Du. do. 

Dunno, dno, do not or docs not know. 

Dut, dirt. 



E. 

Eend, end. 

Ef, if. 

Emptins, yeast. 

Envy, 

Everlasting", an intensive, without 

reference to duration. 
Ev'y, every. 
Ez, as. 



128 



GLOSSARY. 



Fer, for. 

Ferfle, ferful, fearful; also an inten- 
sive. 

Fin', find. 

Fish-skin, used in New England to 
clarify coffee. 

Fix, a difficulty, a nonplus. 

FoJler, folly, to follow. 

Forrerd, forward. 

Frum, from. 

Fur, far. 

Fnrder, farther. 

Furrer, furrow. Metaphorically, to 
draw a straight furrow is to live 
uprightly or decorously. 

Fust, first. 



Gin, gave. 

Git, get. 

Gret, great. 

Grit, spirit, energy, pluck. 

Grout, to sulk. 

Grouty, crabbed, surly. 

Gum, to impose on. 

Gump, a foolish fellow, a dullard. 

Gut, got. 

H. 

Hed, had. 
Heern, heard. 
Helium, helm. 
Hendy, handy. 
Het, heated. 
Hev, have. 
Hez, has. 
Holl, whole. 
Holt, hold. 
Huf, hoof. 
Hull, whole. 
Hum, home. 

Humbug, General Taylor's anti- 
slavery. 
Hut, hurt. 



Idno, I do not know. 

In'my, enemy. 

Insines, ensigns; used to designate 
both the officer who carries the 
standard, and the standard itself. 

Inter, intu, into. 



Jedge, judge. 
Jest, just. 



Jine, join. 
Jint, joint. 

Junk, a fragment of any solid sub- 
stance. 



Keer, care. . 

Kep, kept, 

Killock, a small anchor. 

Kin' kin' o', kinder, kind, kind of. 



Lawth, loath. 

Let day-light into, to shoot. 

Let on, to hint, to confess, to own. 

Lick, to beat, to overcome. 

Lights, the bowels. 

Lily pads, leaves of the water-lily. 

Long-sweetening, molasses. 

Loon, the northern diver. 



Mash, marsh 

Mean, stingy, ill-naturec^ 

Min' 



N. 

Ned, a slang phrase, going it like 
Ned, equivalent to our ' going like 
old Harry.' 

Nimepunce, ninepence, twelve and 
a half cents. 

Nowers, nowhere. 

O. 

Offen, often. 

Ole, old. 

Oilers, olluz, always. 

On, of; used before it or them, or at 
the end of a sentence, as on't, on 
'em, nut ez ever I heerd on. 

On'y, only. 

Ossifer, officer (seldom heard). 
t 

P. 

Peaked, pointed. 

Peek, to peep. 

Pickerel, the pike, a fish. 

Pint, point. 

Pocket full of rocks, plenty of money. 

Pooty, pretty. 

Pop'ler, conceited, popular. 

Pus, purse. 

Put out, troubled, vexed. 



GLOSSARY. 



129 



Quarter, a quarter dollar. 
Queen's arm, a musket. 



Resh, rush. 

Revelee, the reveille. 

Rile, to trouble. 

Riled, angry : disturbed, as the 

sediment in any liquid. 
Riz, r 
Row. a long row to hoe, a difficult 

task: 

ed, robust. 
Row-de-dow, troublesome talk. 



Sarse, abuse, impertinence. 

Sartin, certain. 

Saxon, sacristan, sexton. 

Scaliest, worst. 

Scringe, cringe. 

Scrouge, to crowd. 

Seen, such. 

Set by, valued. 

Shakes, great, of considerable con- 
sequence. 

Shappoes, chapeaux, cocked-hats. 

Sheer, share. 

Shet, shut. 

Shine, a fancy or liking, also written 
shindy. 

Shut, shirt. 

Skeered, scared. 

Skeeter, mosquito. 

Skooting, running or moving swiftly. 

Siarterin', slaughtering. 

Slim, contemptible. 

Snaked, crawled like a snake; hut 
to snake any one out, is to track 
him to his hiding-place ; to snake 
a thing out is to snatch it out. 

Somes, s-fas. 

Sogerin', soldiering; a barharous 
amusement common among men 
in the savage state. 

Som'trs, somewhere. 

So'st, so as that. 

Sot, set, obstinate, resolute. 

Spiles, spoils; objects of political 
ambition. 

Spry, active. 



Staddles, stout stakes driven into the 
salt marshes, on which the hay- 
ricks are set, and thus raised out 
of the reach of high tides. 

Streaked, uncotnf rtable, discom- 
fited. 

Suckle, circle. 

Sutthin', something. 

Suttin, certain. 

Swan, to swear. 



Take on. to sorrow. 

Talents, talons. 

Taters, potatoes. 

Tell, till. 

Tetch, touch. 

Tetch tu, to be able; used always 
after a negative in this sense 

Tollable, tolerable. 

Toot, used derisively for playing on 
any wind instrument. 

Thru, through. 

Thundering, a euphemism common 
in New England, for the profane 
English expression devilish. Per- 
haps derived from the belief, com- 
mon formerly, that thunder was 
caused by the Prince of the Air, 
for some of whose accomplish- 
ments consult Cotton Mather. 

Tu, to, too ; commonly has this 
sound when used emphatically, 
or at the end of a sentence. At 
other times it has the sound of t 
in tough, as Ware ye yoin' tu ? 
Goin' ta Boston. 



U. 

Ugly, ill-tempered, intractable. 
Uncle Sam, United States; the 

largest boaster of liberty atid 

owner of slaves. 
Unrizzest, applied to dough or 

bread ; heavy, most unrisen, cr 

most incapable of rising. 



V spot, a five-dollar bill. 
Vally, value. 



130 



GLOSSARY. 



W. 

Wake snakes, to get into trouble. 

Wal, well; spoken with great 
deliberation, and sometimes with 
the a very much flattened, some- 
times (but more seldom) very 
much broadened. 

Wannut, walnut {hickory). 

Ware, where. 

Ware, were. 

Whopper, an uncommonly large lie ; 
as, that General Taylor is in 
favour of the Wilmot Proviso. 

Wig, Whig ; a party now dissolved. 

Wiz, to whiz ; go off (like a rocket). 

Wunt, will not. 

Wus, worse. 

Wut, what. 



Wuth, worth; as, Antislavery perfes- 
sions 'fore 'lection aint wuth a 
Bungtown copper. 

Wuz, was, sometimes were. 



Yaller, yellow. 
Yeller, yellow. 
Yellers, a disease of peach-trees. 



Z. 



Zach, Ole, a second Washington, an 
antislavery slaveholder, a humane 
buyer and seller of men and women, 
a Christian hero generally. 



I XI) E X. 



A. B., information wanted concern- 
Adam, eldest son of. respected, 10. 

.Eneas goes to hell, 101. 

.Eolus. a seller of money, as is sup- 
posed by some, 101. 

.Eschylus. a saying of, 51. note. 

Alligator, a decent one conjectured 
to be. in some sort, humane, 120. 

Alphonso the Sixth of Portugal, 
tyrannical act of, 120. 

Ambrose, Saint, excellent (but 
rationalistic) sentiment of. 35. 

"American Citizen," new compost 
so called. 104. 

American Eagle, a source of inspira- 
tion, 4.5— hitherto wrongly classed, 
51— long bill of, 51. 

Amos, cited. 34. 

Anakim, tbat they formerly existed, 
shown, 124. 

Angels, providentially speak French, 
23 — conjectured to be skilled in 
all tongues, ib. 

Anglo-Saxondom, its idea, what, 21. 

Anglo-Saxon mask, 21. 

Anglo-Saxon race, 16. 

Anglo-Saxon verse, by whom car- 
ried to perfection. 1 1 . 

Antonius, a speech of, 40 — by 
whom best reported, ib. 

Apocalypse, beast in, magnetic to 
theologian-. 

Apollo, confessed mortal by his own 
oracle, 83. 

Apollyon, bis tragedies popular, 72. 

Appian, an Alexandrian, not equal 
to Shakspeare as an orator, 40. 

Ararat, ignorance of foreign tongues 
is an, 53. 

Arcadian background, 106. 

Aristophanes. 34. 

Arms, profession of, once esteemed 
especially that of gentlemen, 10. 



Arnold, 42. 

Ashland, 10G. 

Astor, Jacob, a rich man, 91. 

Astraea, nineteenth century forsaken 

by. 102. 
Athenians, ancient, an institution 

of, 41. 
Atherton, Senator, envies the loon, 

60. 
Austin, St., profane wish of, 43, 

note. 
Aye-Aye, the, an African animal, 

America supposed to be settled 

by, 25. 



Babel, probably the first Congress, 53 
— a gabble-mill, ib. 

Baby, a low-priced one, 98. 

Bagowind, Hon. Mr., whether to be 
damned, 63. 

Baldwin apples, 125. 

Baratarias, real or imaginary, which 
most pleasant, 102. 

Barnum, a great natural curiosity 
recommended to, 49. 

Barrels, an inference from seeing, 
125. 

Baton Rouge, 106 — strange pecu- 
liarities of labourers at, 107. 

Baxter, R., a saying of, 35. 

Bay, Mattysqumscot, 119. 

Bay State, singular effect produced 
on military officers by leaving it, 
21. 

Beast in Apocalypse, a loadstone, 
for whom, 83. 

Beelzebub, his rigadoon, 61. 

Behmen, his letters not letters, 7C. 

Bellers, a saloon-keeper, 111 — in - 
humanly refuses credit to a pru- 
dential candidate, 112. 

Biglow, Ezekiel, his letter to Hon. 



132 



INDEX. 



J. T. Buckingham, 1 — never 
heard of any one named Mun- 
dishes, 2 — nearly four-score years 
old, ib. — his aunt Keziah, a nota- 
ble saying of, 3. 
Biglow, Hosea, excited by composi- 
tion, 2 — a poem by, 3, 66 — his 
opinion of war, 4 — wanted at 
home by Nancy, 7 — recommends 
a forcible enlistment of warlike 
editors, ib. — would not wonder, 
if generally agreed with, 9 — -versi- 
fies letter of Mr. Sawin, 11 — a 
letter from, 12, 57,77— his opinion 
of Mr. Sawin, 12 — does not deny 
fun at Cornwallis, 14, note — his 
idea of militia glory, 17, note — 
a pun of, 18, note — is uncertain 
in regard to people of Boston, ib. 
— had never heard of Mr. John P. 
Robinson, 27 — aliquid sufflami- 
nandus, 28 — his poems attributed 
to a Mr. Lowell, 33 — is unskilled 
in Latin, ib. — his poetry maligned 
by some, 34 — his disinterested- 
ness, ib. — his deep share in com- 
monweal, ib. — his claim to the 
presidency, ib. — his mowing, ib. 

— resents being called Whig, 35 

— opposed to tariff, ib. — obsti- 
nate, ib. — infected with peculiar 
notions, ib. — reports a speech, 40 
— emulates historians of antiquity, 
ib. — his character sketched from 
a hostile point of view, 52 — a 
request of his complied with, 64 

— appointed at a public meeting 
in Jaalam, 77 — confesses igno- 
rance, in one minute particular, 
of propriety, ib. — his opinion of 
cocked hats, ib. — letter to, ib. — 
called " Dear Sir," by a general, 
ib. — probably receives same com- 
pliment from two hundred and 
nine, ib.— picks his apples, 125 — 
his crop of Baldwins conjecturally 
large, ib. 

Billings, Dea. Cephas, 14. 

Birch, virtue of, in instilling certain 

of the dead languages, 100. 
Bird of our country sings hosanna, 

16. 
Blind, to go it, 98. 
Blitz pulls ribbons from his mouth, 

16, 
Bluenose potatoes, smell of, eagerly 

desired 17. 



Bobtail obtains a cardinal's hat, 25. 

Bolles, Mr. Secondary, author of 
prize peace essay, 15 — presents 
sword to Lieutenant Colonel, ib. — 
a fluent orator, ib. — found to be 
in error, 17. 

Bonaparte, N., a usurper, 83. 

Boot-trees, productive, where, 100. 

Boston, people of, supposed edu- 
cated, 18, note. 

Brahmins, navel-contemplating, 74. 

Bread-trees, 100. 

Brigadier-Generals in militia, de- 
votion of, 38. 

Brown, Mr., engages in an unequal 
contest, 63. 

Browne, Sir T., a pious nnd wise 
sentiment of, cited and com- 
mended, 11. 

Buckingham, Hon. J. T., editor of 
the Boston Courier, letters to, 1, 
12,33, 57 — not afraid, 13. 

Buffalo, a plan hatched there, 115 
— plaster, a prophecy in regard to, 
ib. 

Buncombe, hi the other world sup- 
posed. 41. 

Bung, the eternal, thought to be 
loose, 7. 

Bungtown Fencibles, dinner of, 26. 

Butter in Irish bogs, 100. 



C, General, commended for parts, 
29 — for ubiquity, ib. — for con- 
sistency, ib — for fidelity, ib. — is 
in favour of war, ib. — his curious 
valuation of principle, ib. 

Caesar, tribute to, 66— his veni, vidi, 
vici, censured for undue pro- 
lixity, 85. 

Cainites, sect of, supposed still 
extant, 10. 

Caleb, a monopoly of his denied, 15 
— curious notions of, as to mean- 
ing of "shelter," 19 —his defini- 
tion of Anglo-Saxon, 20 ■ — charges 
Mexicans (not with bayonets, but) 
with improprieties, ib. 

Calhoun, Hon. J. C, his cow-bell 
curfew, light of the nineteenth 
century to be extinguished at 
sound of, 55 — cannot let go 
apron-string of the Past, ib. — his 
unsuccessful tilt at Spirit of the 
Age, 56 — the Sir Kay of modern 
chivalry, ib.— his anchor made of 



INDEX. 



133 



a crooked pin, 57 — mentioned, 
53 — 61. 

ambridge Platform, use discovered 
for, 24." 

Canary Islands, 100. 

Candidate, presidential, letter from, 
74 — smells a rat. 7.s — against a 
bank, 71) — takes a revolving posi- 
tion, ib. — opinion of pledges, 80 

— is a periwig, ib. — fronts south 
by north, 81 — qualifications of, 
lessening, So — wooden leg (and 
head) u.-eful to. 96. 

Cape Cod clergymen, what, 24 — 
Sabbath-breakers, perhaps, re- 
proved by, ib. 

Carpini, Father John de Piano, 
among the Tartars, 123. 

Cartier. Jacques, commendable zeal 
of, 123. 

Cass, General, 59 — clearness of his 
merit, GO — limited popularitv at 
•'Bellers's," 111. 

Castles, Spanish, comfortable ac- 
commodations in, 102. 

Cato. letters of, so called, suspended 
naso adunco, 76. 

C. l>.. friends of, can hear of him, 
7.;. 

Chalk egg, we are proud of incuba- 
tion of, 75. 

Chappelow oo Job, a copy of, lost, 
65. 

Cherubusco, news of, its effects on 
English royalty, 50. 

Chesterfield no letter-writer, 76. 

Chief Magistrate, dancing esteemed 
sinful by. 24. 

Children naturally speak Hebrew, 
11. 

China-tree, 100. 

Chinese, whether they invented 
gunpowder before the Christian 
era, not considered, 25. 

Choate hired. 113. 

Christ shuffled into Apocrypha. 25 

— conjectured to disapprove of 
slaughter and pillage, 30 — con- 
demns a certain piece of barbarism, 
63. 

Christianity, profession of, plebian, 
whether, 10. 

Christian soldiers, perhaps incon- 
sistent, whether, 38. 

Cicero, an opinion of, disputed, 84. 

Cilley, Ensign, author of nefarious 
sentiment, 26. 



Cimex lectularius, IS. 

Cincinnati^, a stock character in 
modern comedy, 106. 

Civilization, progress of, an alias, 
65 — rides upon a powder-cart, 79. 

Clergymen, their ill husbandry, 64 
— their place in processions, 105 
some, cruelly banished for the 
soundness of their lungs, 123. 

Cocked-hat, advantages of being 
knocked into, 77. 

College of Cardinals, a strange one, 
25. 

Colman, Dr. Benjamin, anecdote of, 
3S. 

Coloured folks, curious national 
diversion of kicking, 19. 

Colquitt, a remark of, 60 — ac- 
quainted with some principles of 
aerostation, ib. 

Columbia, District of, its peculiar 
climatic effects, 44 — not certian 
that Martin is for abolishing it, 
115. 

Columbus, a Paul Prv of genius, 74. 

Columby, 109. 

Complete Letter-Writer, fatal gift 
of, 82. 

Compostella, St. James of, seen, 22. 

Congress, singular consequence of 
getting into. 43. 

Congressional debates, found in- 
structive, 53. 

Constituents, useful for what, 44. 

Constitution trampled on, 58 — to 
stand upon, what, 78. 

Convention, what, 44. 

(on vention, Springfield, 44. 

Coon, old, pleasure in skinning, 59. 

Coppers, caste in picking up of, 94. 

Copres, a monk, his excellent 
method of arguing, 54. 

Cornwallis, a, 14 — acknowledged 
entertaining, ib., note. 

Cotton Mather, summoned as wit- 
ness, 23. 

Country lawyers, sent providen- 
tially, 31. 

Country, our, its boundaries more 
exactly defined, 32 — right or 
wrong, nonsense about exposed, ib. 

Courier, The Boston, an unsafe 
print, 52. 

Court, General, fanners sometimes 
attain seats in, 107. 

Cowper, W., his letters commended, 



134 



INDEX. 



Creed, a safe kind of, 97. 
Crusade, first American, 23. 
Cuneiform script recommended, 85. 
Curiosity distinguishes man from 
brutes, 74. 

Davis, Mr., of Mississippi, a remark 
of his, 59. 

Day and Martin, proverbially "on 
hand," 2. 

Death, rings down curtain, 72. 

Delphi, orac] r»f, surpassed, 51, note 
—alluded to, 83. 

Destiny, her account, 49. 

Devil, the, unskilled in certain In- 
dian tongues, 23. 

Dey of Tripoli, 55. 

Diaz, Bernal, has a vision, 22 -his 
relationship to the Scarlet Wo- 
man, ib. 

Didymus, a somewhat voluminous 
grammarian, 83. 

Dighton rock character might be 
usefully employed in some emer- 
gencies, 84. 

Dimitry Bruisgins, fresh supply of, 
73. 

Diogenes, his zeal for propagating 
certain variety of olive, 100. 

Dioscuri, imps of the pit, 23. 

District-Attorney, contemptible con- 
duct of one, 55. 

Ditchwater on brain, a too common 
ailing, 54. 

Doctor, the, a proverbial saying of, 
22. 

Doughface, yeast-proof, 69. 

Drayton, a martyr, 55 — north star, 
culpable for aiding, whether, 62. 

Earth, Dame, a peep at her house- 
keeping, 56. 

Eating words, habit of, convenient 
in time of famine, 49. 

Eavesdroppers, 74. 

Editor, his positif n, 64 — command- 
ing pulpit of, ib — la ge congrega- 
tion of, ib. — name derived from 
what, 66 — fondness for mutton, 
ib. — a pious one, his creed, ib. — a 
showman, 71 — in danger of sudden 
arrest, without bail, 72. 

Editors, certain ones who crow like 
cockerels, 7. 

Egyptian darkness, phial of, use for, 
84. 



Eldorado, Mr. Sawin sets sail for, 
100. 

Elizabeth, Queen, mistake of her 
ambassador, 41. 

Empedocles, 74. 

Employment, regular, a good thing, 
93. 

Epaulets, perhaps no badge of saint- 
ship, 30, 

Episcopius, his marvellous oratory, 
123. 

Eric, king of Sweden, his cap, 101. 

Evangelists, iron ones, 24. 

Eyelids, a divine shield against 
authors, 54. 

Ezekiel, text taken from, 64. 



Factory-girls, expected rebellion of, 

60. 
Family-trees, fruit of jejune, 100. 
Faneuil Hall, a place where persons 

tap themselves for a species of 

hydrocephalus, 54 — a bill of fare 

mendaciously advertised in, 100. 
Father of country, his shoes, 108. 
Female Papists, cut off in midst of 

idolatry, 104. 
Fire, we all like to play with it, 56. 
Fish, emblematic, but disregarded, 

where, 54. 
Flam, President, untrustworthy, 45. 
Fly-leaves, providential increase of, 

54. 
Foote, Mr., his taste for field-sports, 

58. 
Fourier, a squinting toward, 52. 
Fourth of Julys, boiling, 4'2. 
France, a strange dance begun in, 61 . 
Fuller, Dr. Thomas, a wise saying 

of, 28. 
Funnel, Old, hurraing in, 15. 



Gawain, Sir, his amusements, 56. 

Gay, S, H., Esquire, editor of Na- 
tional Antislavery Standard, letter 
to, 74. 

Getting up early, 4, 20. 

Ghosts, some, presumed fidgetty, 
(but see Stilling's Pneumatology,) 
75. 

Giants formerly stupid, 56. 

Gift of Tongues, distressing case 
of, 53. 

Globe Theatre, cheap season-ticket 
to, 72. 



INDEX. 



135 



Glory, a perquisite of offu-ers, Oi- 
lier account with B. Sawin, Esq., 
99. 

Goatsnose, the celebrated interview. 
With, 84. 

Crav's letters are letters. 76. 

Great horn spoon, sworn by, 58. 

Greeks, ancient, whether they ques- 
tioned candidal s, 84. 

Green Man, sign of, 35. 

Hani, sandwich, an orthodox (but 

peculiar) on 
Hamlets, machine for making, 87. 
Hammon, 51. note, S3. 
H mnegan, Mr., something said by, 

Harrison, General, how preserved, 

Hat-trees, in full bearing, 100. 
Hawkins. Sir John, stout, something 

he sav 
Henry the Fourth of England, a 

Parliament of. how named, 41. 
Hercules, his second labour probably 

what, 124. 
Herodotus, story from, 11. 
Hesperides, an inference from, 100. 
Holden. Mr. Shearjashnb, Preceptor 

of Jaalam Academy, 83 — his know- 
ledge of Greek limited, ib. — a 
of his. ib. — leaves a fund 

to propagate it, S4. 
Hollis, Ezra, goes to a Comwallis, 

14. 
Hollow, why men providentially so 

constructed, 42. 
Homer, a phrase of. cited, 65. 
Homers, democratic ones, plums 

left for, 46. 
Howell, James, Esq., story to'.d by, 

41 — lctter> of, crmmended, 76. 
Human rights out of order on the 

floor of Co 
Humbug, ascription of pn. i 
- neraliy believed in, ib. 
Husbandry, instance of bad, 28. 

Icarius, Penelope's father, 32. 

Infants, prattling* of, curious obser- 
vation concerning, 11. 

Information wanted (universally, 
but especially at page), 76. 

Jaalam Centre, Anglo-Saxons un- 
justly suspected by the young 



ladies tiicre, 21 — "Independent 
Blunderbuss," strange conduct of 
editor of, 64 — public meeting at. 
77. 

Jaalam Point, light house on char?: 
of prospectively offered to.Mr. i.. 
Biglow, 81 — meeting-house orna- 
mented with imaginary clock, 102. 

Jakes, Captain, 111) — reproved for 
avarice, ib. 

James the Fourth of Scots, experi- 
ment by, 11. 

Jarnagin,' Mr., his opinion of the 
completeness of Northern educa- 
tion, 60. 

Jerome, Saint, his list of sacred 
writers, 76. 

Job, Book of, 10 — Chappelow on, 65. 

Johnson, Mr., communicates some 
intelligence. 61. 

Jonah, the inevitable destiny of, 62 
— probably studied internal econo- 
my of the cefacea, 75. 

Jortin, Dr., cited ."9, 51. note. 

Judea. everything not known there- 
31. 

Juvenal, a saying of, 50, nolo. 

Kav. Sir, the, of modern chivalry, 

who, 56. 
Key, brazen one, 55. 
Keziah, Aunt, profound observation 

of, 3. 
Kinderhook, 106. 

Kingdom Come, march to, easy, 89. 
Konigsmark, Count. 10. 

Lamb, Charles, his epistolary excel- 
lence, 76. 

Latimer, Bishop, episcopizes Satan, 
10. 

Latin tongue, curious information 
concerning, 33. 

Launcelot, Sir, a trusser of giants 
formerly, perhaps would find less 
sport therein now, 56. 

Letters clas>ed, 76 — their shape, ib. 
— of candidates, 81— often fatal, 82. 
Philip, a scourger of young 
native Americans, 50 — commise- 
rated (though not deserving it,) 
51 , note. 

L ; berator, a newspaper, condemned 
by implication. 35. 

Liberty unwholesome for men of 
certain complexions, 66. 



136 



INDEX. 



Lignum vitse, a gift of this valuable 

wood proposed, 22. 
Longinus recommends swearing, 13, 

note (Fuseli did same thing). 
Long sweetening recommended, 90. 
Lost arts, one sorrowfully added to 

list of, 124. 
Louis the Eleventh of France, some 

odd trees of his, 100. 
Lowell, Mr. J. R., unaccountable 

silence of, 33. 
Luther, Martin, his first appearance 

as Europa, 22. 
Lyttelton, Lord, his letters, an impo- 
sition, 76. 



Macrobii, their diplomacy, 84. 

Mahomet, got nearer Sinai than 
some, 66. 

Mahound, his filthy gobbets, 23. 

Mangum, Mr., speaks to the point, 
58. 

Manichsean, excellently confuted,54. 

Man-trees, grew where, 100. 

Mares'-nests, finders of, benevolent, 
75. 

Marshfield, 106, 113. 

Martin, Mr. Sawin used to vote for 
him, 115. 

Mason and Dixon's line, slaves north 
of, 58. 

Mass, the, its duty defined, 59. 

Massachusetts, on her knees, 8 — 
something mentioned in connec- 
tion with, worthy the attention of 
tailors, 44, — citizen of, baked, 
boiled, and roasted (nefandum /), 
95. 

Masses, the, used as butter by some, 
46. 

M. C, an invertebrate animal, 49. 

Mechanics' Fair, reflections sug- 
gested at, 87. 

Mentor, letters of, dreary, 76. 

Mephistopheles at a nonplus, 62. 

Mexican blood, its effect in raising 
price of cloth, 103. 

Mexican polka, 24. 

Mexicans charged with various 
breaches of etiquette, 22— kind 
feelings beaten into them, 70. 

Mexico, no glory in overcoming, 45. 

Military glory spoken disrespectfully 
of, 17, note — militia treated still 
worse, ib. 

Milk-trees, growing still, 100. 



Mills for manufacturing gabble, how 

driven, 53. 
Milton, an unconscious plagiary, 43, 

note— a, Latin verse of, cited, 66. 
Missions, a profitable kind of, 67. 
Monarch, a pagan, probably not 

favoured in philosophical experi- 
ments, 12. 
Money-trees desirable, 100 — that 

they once existed shown to be 

variously probable, ib. 
Montaigne, a communicative old 

Gascon, 75. 
Monterey, battle of, its singular 

chromatic effect on a species of 

two-headed eagle, 50. 
Moses held up vainly as an example, 

65 — construed by Joe Smith, ib. 
Myths, how to interpret readily, 84. 

Naboths, Popish ones, how distin- 
guished, 25. 

Nation, rights of, proportionate to 
size, 20. 

National pudding, its effect on the 
organs of speech, a curious physi- 
ological fact, 25. 

Nephelim, not yet extinct, 124. 

New England overpoweringly ho- 
noured, 48 — wants no more speak- 
ers, ib.— done brown by whom, ib. 
her experience in beans beyond 
Cicero's, 84. 

Newspaper, the, wonderful, 70— a 
strolling theatre, 71 — thoughts 
suggested by tearing Avrapper of, 
72 — a vacant sheet, ib — a sheet in 
which a vision was let down, 73 — 
wrapper to a bar of soap, ib — a 
cheap impromptu platter, ib. 

New York, Letters from, commended, 
76. 

Next life, what, 72. 

Niggers, 5 — area of abusing ex- 
tended, 46 — Mr. Sawin's opinions 
of, 117. 

Ninepence a day low for murder, 14. 

No, a monosyllable, 25— hard to 
utter, ib. 

Noah, inclosed letter in bottle, pro- 
bably, 75. 

Nomas, Lapland, what, 101. 

North, has no business, 58 — brist- 
ling, crowded off roost, 81. 

North Bend, geese inhumanly treated 
at, 82 -mentioned, 113. 



INDEX. 



137 



North Star, a proposition to indict, 
63, 

Off ox, 70. 

Officers, miraculous transformation 
in character of, 21 — Anglo-Saxon, 
come very near being anathema- 
tized. 22. 

O'Phace. Increase D., Esq., speech 
of. -10. 

Oracle of Fools, still respectfully 
consulted, 41. 

Orion, becomes commonplace, 73. 

Orrery. Lord, his letters (lord!). 76. 

Ostracism, curious species of, 41. 

Palestine. 23. 

Palfrey, Hon. J. G., 41, 50 (a worthy 

representative of Massachusetts. - ) 
Pantagruel recommends a popular 

oracle, 11. 
Panurge. his interview with Goats- 

nosi. 
Papists, female, slain by zealous 

Protestant bomb shell, 104. 
Paralipomenon, a man suspected of 

being. n2. 
Paris, liberal principles safe as far 

away I 
Parliameiitum Indoctorum sitting in 

permanence. 1 I. 
Past, the, a good nurse, 55. 
Patience, sister, quoted, 16. 
Paynims, their throats propagand- 

istically cut, 23. 
Penelope, her wise choice, 32. 
People, soft enough. 6S — want cor- 
rect ideas, 97. 
Pepin, King, 76. 
Periwig, 80. 

Persius, a pithy saying of, 46, note. 
Pescara. Marquis, saying of, 10. 
Peter, Saint, a letter of (post-mortem), 

76. 
Pharisees, opprobriously referred to, 

66. 
Philippe, Louis, in pea-jacket, 71. 
Phlegyas quoted, 63. 
Phrygian language, whether Adam 

spoke it. 11. 
Pilgrims, the, 45. 
Pillows, constitutional, 49. 
Pinto, Mr., some letters of his com- 
mended, 76 
Pisgah, an impromptu one, 100. 
Platform, partv, a convenient one, 

97. 



Plato, supped with, 75 — his man, 82. 
Pleiades, the, not enough esteemed, 
73. 

Pliny, his letters not admired, 76. 

Plotinus. a story of. 55. 

Plymouth Rock, Old, a Convention 

wrecked on, 45. 
Point Tribulation, Mr.Sawin wrecked 
on, 100. 

Poles, exile, whether crop of beans 
depends on, 19, note. 

Polk, President, synonymous wit 
our country, 30 — censured, 44 — in 
danger of being crushed, 46. 

Polka, Mexican, 24. 

Pomp, a runaway slave, his nest, 
117 — hypocritically groans like 
white man, 118 — blind to Chris- 
tian privileges, 119 — his society- 
valued at fifty dollars, ib— his 
treachery, 120 — takes Mr. Sawin 
prisoner, 121— cruelly makes him 
work, ib — puts himself illegally 
under his tuition, 122— dismisses 
him with contumelious epithets, 
ib. 

Pontifical bull, a tamed one, 22 

Pope, his verse excellent, 11. 

Pork, refractory in boiling. 22. 

Portugal, Alphonso the Sixth of, a 
monster, 123. 

Post, Boston, 33 -shaken visibly, 
34— bad guide-post, ib — too swift, 
ib — edited by a colonel, ib — who 
is presumed officially in Mexico, 
ib -referred to, 59. 

Pot-hooks, death in, 59. 

Preacher, an ornamental symbol, 65 
—a breeder of dogmas, ib— ear- 
nestness of, important, 123. 

Present, considered as an annalist, 
65— not long wonderful, 73. 

President, slaveholding natural to, 
66— must be a Southern resident, 
98— must own a nigger, ib. 

Principle, exposure spoils it, 43. 

Principles, bad, when less harmful, 
27. 

Prophecy, a notable one, 51, note. 

Proviso, bitterly spoken of, 79. 

Prudence, sister, her idiosyncratic 
teapot, 92. 

Psammeticus, an experiment of, 11. 

Public opinion a blind and drunken 
guide, 25 — nudges Mr. Wilbur's 
elbow, 26— ticklers of, 45. 

Pythagoras a bean-hater, why, 84. 



138 



INDEX. 



Pythagoreans, fish reverenced by, 
why, 54. 

Quixote, Don, 57. 

Rag, one of sacred college, 25. 
Rantoul, Mr., talks loudly, 16 — 

pious reason for not enlisting, ib. 
Recruiting sergeant, Devil supposed 

the first, 10. 
Representatives' Chamber, 54. 
Rhinothism, society for promoting, 

74. 
Rhyme, whether natural not con- 
sidered, 11. 
Rib, an infrangible one, 90. 
Richard the First of England, his 

Christian fervour, 23. 
Riches conjectured to have legs as 

well as wings, 62. 
Robinson, Mr.Jchn P., his opinions 

fully stated, 27—31. 
Rocks, pocket full of, 91. 
Rough and Ready, 111— a wig, 112— 

— a kind of scratch, ib. 
Russian eagle turns Prussian blue, 

blue, 50. 

Sabbath, breach of, 27. 

Sabellianism, one accused of, 82. 

Saltillo, unfavourable view of, 17. 

Salt-river in, Mexican, what, 17. 

Samuel, Uncle, riotous, 50 — yet has 
qualities demanding reverence, 66, 
a good provider for his family, 68 
— an exorbitant bill of, 103. 

Sansculottes, draw their wine before 
drinking, 61. 

Santa Anna, his expensive leg, 96. 

Satan, never wants attorneys, 22— an 
expert talker by signs ib. — a suc- 
cessful fisherman with little or no 
bait, 23 — cunning fetch of, 27— 
dislikes ridicule, 34 — ought not 
to have credit of ancient oracles, 

' 51, note. 

Satirist, incident to certain dangers, 
28. 

Savages, Canadian, chance of re- 
demption offered to, 123. 

Sawin, B., Esquire, his letter not 
written in verse, 11 — a native of 
Jaalam, 12— not regular attendant 
on Rev. Mr. Wilbur's preaching, 
ib — a fool, ib — his statements 
trustworthy, ib— his ornithological 



tastes, ib— letter from, 13, 86, 106 
— his curious discovery in regard 
to bayonets, 15 -displays proper 
family pride, ib — modestly con- 
fesses himself less wise than the 
Queen of Sheba, 19 — the old Adam 
in, peeps out, 21 — a miles emeritus, 
86— is made text for a sermon, ib 
— loses a leg, 88— an eye, 89 — left 
hand, ib — four fingers of right 
hand, ib— has six or more ribs 
broken, ib — a rib of his infrangi- 
ble, 90— allows a certain amount of 
preterite greenness in himself, 90, 
91 — his share of spoil limited, ib 
— his opinion of Mexican climate, 
92 — acquires property of a certain 
sort, 93 — his experience of glory, 
93, 94 — stands sentry, and puns 
thereupon, 95 — undergoes martyr- 
dom in some of its most painful 
forms, ib — enters the candidating 
business, 96 — modestly states the 
(avail) abilities which qualify him 
for high political station, 96, 99 — 
has no principles, 96— a peaceman, 
ib — unpledged, 97 — has no objec- 
tions to owning peculiar property, 
but would not like to monopolize 
the truth, 98 — his account with 
glory, 99 — a selfish motive hinted 
in, 100 — sails for Eldorado, ib— 
shipwrecked on a metaphorical 
promontory, ib — parallel between, 
and Rev. Mr. Wilbur (not Plutar- 
chian), 102 — conjectured to have 
bathed in river Selemnus, 106 — 
loves plough wisely, but not too 
well, ib — a foreign mission pro- 
bably expected by, 107 — unani- 
mously nominated for presidency, 
108 — his country's father-in-law, 
109 — nobly emulates Cincinnatus, 
110 — is not a crooked stick, ib — 
advises his adherents, ib — views 
of, on present state of politics, 
110 — 117 — popular enthusiasm for, 
at Bellers's, and its disagreeable 
consequences, 11 1 — inhuman treat- 
ment of, by Bellers, 112 — his 
opinion of the two parties, 113 — 
agrees with Mr. Webster, ib — his 
antislavery zeal, 115 — his proper 
self-respect, ib — his unaffected 
piety, ib — his not intemperate 
temperance, 117— a thrilling ad- 
venture of, 117 — 122 — his prudence 



INDEX. 



139 



and economy, 117 — bound to 
Captain Jakes, but regains his 

' freedom. Ill' — is taken prisoner. 
121 — 122— ignominiously treated, 
121 — 122 — his consequent reso- 
lution. 122. 

Sayres, a martyr, 55. 

Scaliger; Baying of, 28. 

Scarabceus piluloriut, IS. 

Scott. General, his claims to the 
presidency. 34, 37. 

Scythians, their diplomacy com- 
mended, 84. 

Seamen, coloured, sold, 8. 

Selemnus, a sort of Lethean river, 
106. 

Senate, debate in, made readable, 55. 

Seneca, saying of, 27 — another, 51 
— overrated by a saint (but see 
Lord Bolingbroke's opinion of, in 
a letter to Dean Swift), 76 — his 
letters not commended, ib — a 
son of Rev. Mr. Wilbur, 102. 

Serbonian bog of literature. 54. 

Sextons, demand for, 61 — heroic 
official devotion of one, 120. 

Shaking fever, considered as an 
employer, 93. 

Shaksneare. a good reporter, 40. 

Sham. President, honest, 45. 

Sheba, Queen of, 19. 

Sheep, none of Rev. Mr. Wilburs 
turned wolves, 12. 

Shem, Scriptural curse of, 122. 

Show, natural to love it, 17, note. 

Silver spoon born in Democracy's 
mouth what, 43. 

Sinai suffers outrages, 66. 

Sin. wilderness of, modern, what, 16. 

Skin, hole in, strange taste of some 
for, 94. 

Slaughter, whether God strengthen 
us for. 24. 

Slaughterers and soldiers compared, 
104. 

Slaughtering nowadays is slaughter- 
ing, 104. 

Slavery, of no colour, 6 — corner- 
stone of liberty, 52 — also key- 
stone, 58 — last crumb of Eden, 
61 — - a Jonah, 62 — an institution, 
80 — a private State concern, 118. 

Smith, Joe, used as a translation, 65. 

Smith, John, an interesting char- 
acter. 7 i. » 

Smith, Mr., fears entertained for, 
63 — -dined with, 75. 



Smith, X. B., his magnanimity, 75. 
Soandso, Mr., the great, defines his 

position, 75. 
Sol. the fisherman, 18 — soundness 

of respiratory organs hypotheti- 

cally attributed to. ib. 
Solon, a saying of, 25. 
South Carolina, futile attempt to 

anchor, 57. 
Spanish, to walk, what, 20. 
Speech-making, an abuse of gift of 

speech, 53. 
Star, north, subject to indictment, 

whether. 62. 
Store, cheap cash, a wicked fraud, 

102. 
Stronsr, Governor Caleb, a patriot, 

32. 
Swearing, commended as a figure of 

speech, 13, note. 
Swift, Dean, threadbare saving of, 

34. 

Tag, elevated to the Cardinalate, 25. 

Taxes, direct, advantages of, 103. 

Taylor zeal, its origin, 111 — General, 
greased by Mr. Choate, 113. 

Thanks, get lodged, 93. 

Thirty-nine articles might be made 
serviceable, 24. 

Thor, a foolish attempt of, 57. 

Thumb, General Thomas, a valuable 
member of society, 49. 

Thunder, supposed in easy circum- 
stances, 90. 

Thynne, Mr., murdered, 10. 

Time, an innocent persorage to 
swear by, 13, note— a scene-shifter. 
72. 

Toms, Peeping, 74. 

Trees, various kinds of extraordi- 
nary ones, 100. 

Trowbridge, William, mariner, ad- 
venture of, 24. 

Truth and falsehood start from same 
point, 27 — truth invulnerable to 
satire, ib — compared to a river, 
40 — of fiction sometimes truer 
than fact, ib — told plainly, passim. 

Tuileries, exciting scene at, 51. 

Tully, a saying of, 43, note. 

Tweedledee, gospel according to, 66. 

Tweedledum, great principles of, 66. 

Ulysses, husband of Penelope, 32— 
borrows money, 101. (For full 



HO 



INDEX. 



particulars of, see Homer and 
Dante.) 
University, triennial catalogue of, 
36. 



Van Buren fails of gaining Mr. 
Sawin's confidence, 116— his son 
John reproved, ib. 

Van, Old, plan to set up, 115. 

Venetians, invented something once, 
101. 

Vices, cardinal, sacred conclave of, 
24. 

Victoria, Queen, her natural terror, 
50. 

Vratz, Captain, a Pomeranian, sin- 
gular views of, 10. 



Walpole, Horace, glassed, 75 — his 
letters praised, 76. 

Waltham Plain, Cornwallis at. 14. 

Walton, punctilious in his inter- 
course with fishes, 25. 

War, abstract, horrid, 79 — its hop- 
pers, grist of, what, 94. 

Warton, Thomas, a story of, 38. 

Washington, charge brought against, 
109. 

Washington, city of, climatic influ- 
ence of, on coats, 44 — mentioned, 
55— grand jury of, 62. 

Washingtons, two hatched at a time 
by improved machine, 109. 

Wate, Taunton, proverbially weak, 
117. 

Water-trees, 100. 

Webster, some sentiments of, com- 
mended by Mr. Sawin, 113. 

Westcott, Mr., his horror, 61. 

Whig party, has a large throat, 35 — 
but query as to swallowing spurs, 
114. 

White-house, 81. 

Wife-trees, 100. 

Wilbur, Rev. Homer, A.M.," con- 
sulted, 2— his instructions to his 
flock, 12 — a proposition of his for 
Protestant bombshells, 24 — his 
elbow nudged, 2G — his notions of 



satire, 27 — some opinions of his 
quoted with apparent approval by 
Mr Biglow, 31— geographical spe- 
culations of, 32— a justice of the 
peace, ib — a letter of, 33— a Latin 
pun of, ib — runs against a post 
without injury, 34 — does not seek 
notoriety (whatever some malig- 
nants may affirm), 36— fits youths 
for college, ib — a chaplain during 
late war with England, 38 — a 
shrewd observation of, 40 — some 
curious speculations of, 52, 54 — 
his martello-tower, 53— forgets he 
is not in pulpit, 62, 86 — extracts 
from sermon of, 64, 70 — interested 
in John Smith, 74— his views con- 
cerning present state of letters, 
74, 77 — a stratagem of, 82- ven- 
tures two hundred and fourth inter- 
pretation of Beast in Apocalypse, 
83 — christens Hon. B. Sawin, then 
an infant, 86 — an addition to our 
sylva proposed by, 100 — curious 
and instructive adventure of, 101, 
102 — his account with an unna- 
tural uncle, 103 — his uncomfort- 
able imagination, 104 — specula- 
tions concerning Cincinnatus, 106 
— confesses digressive tendency of 
mind, 123 — goes to work on ser- 
mon (not without fear that his 
readers will dub him with a re- 
proachful epithet like that with 
which Isaac Allerton, a Mayflower 
man, revenges himself on a delin- 
quent debtor of his, calling him 
in his will, and [thus holding him 
up to posterity', as "John Peter- 
son, The Bore"), 125. 

Wilbur, Mrs., an invariable rule of, 
37 — her profile, ib. 

Wildbore, a vernacular one, how to 
escape, 54. 

Wind, the, a good Samaritan, 86. 

Wooden leg, remarkable for sobriety, 
88 — never eats pudding, 90. 

Wright, Colonel, providentially res- 
cued, 18. 

Wrong, abstract, safe to oppose, 46. 

Zack, Old, 110. 



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" Ordinary English readers know little of Tyll Eulenspiegel, or, as his 
name is translated, Tyll Owlglass, a famous person in German mediaeval 
story, and one whose acquaintance they will be glad to make through 
Mr. Mackenzie's version. . . . Mr. Mackenzie's translation is well calculated 
to popularize this work. The book is beautifully printed, and the illus 
trations by Alfred Crowquill worthy of his fame." 



TRUBNER & CO.'S 



REYNARD THE FOX. 

After the German Version of Goethe. 
By Thomas J. Arnolb, Esq. 

" Fair jester's humour and merry wit 
Never offend, though smartly they hit." 

WITH SEVENTY ILLUSTRATIONS, AFTER THE CELEBRATED DESIGNS 
BY WILHELM VON KATJLBACH. 

Royal 8vo. Printed by Clay, on toned paper, and elegantly 
bound in embossed cloth, with appropriate Design after 
Kaulbach, richly tooled front and back, price 16s. Best 
full morocco, same pattern, price 24s. ; or neatly half bound 
morocco, gilt top, uncut edges, Roxburgh style, price 18s. 

" The translation of Mr. Arnold has been held more truly to represent 
the spirit of Goethe's great poem than any other version of the legend." 



Preparing for Publication, 
ON THE 

STUDY OF MODERN LANGUAGES 

IN GENERAL, AND OF 
THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE IN PARTICULAR. 

BY DR. DAVID ASHER. 

In One Volume 12mo. cloth. 

"I have read Dr. Asher's Essay on the Study of the Modern Languages 
with profit and pleasure, and think it might be usefully reprinted here. It 
would open to many English students of their own language some inte- 
resting points from which to regard it, and suggest to them works bearing 
upon it which otherwise they might not have heard of. Any weakness 
which it has in respect of the absolute or relative value of English authors 
does not materially affect its value."— Richard C. Trench. 



LIST OF NEW PUBLICATIONS. 



PREPARING FOR PUBLICATION, 

DEDICATED, BT PERMISSION", TO 

HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS PRINCE ALBERT. 

In one volume 8vo. handsomely printed, uniform with Dr. 
Livingstone's Travels, and accompanied by a Portrait of 
the Author, numerous Illustrations, and a Map, 

NARRATIVE 

OF 

MISSIONARY RESIDENCE 

AND 

TRAVEL IN EASTERN AFRICA, 

DURING THE YEARS 1837-1855. 
By J. L. Krapf, Ph. D. 

One of the Agents of the Church Missionary Society in Abyssinia 
and the Equatorial Countries of Eastern Africa. 

The present volume will be acceptable at once to the friends 
of Missions, to those interested in geographical discoveries, and 
to the lovers of adventure. Few Missionaries have undergone 
greater sufferings and been exposed to greater perils than those 
first fully disclosed in this work as having been voluntarily 
fronted by Dr. Krapf. The value of his geographical dis- 
coveries it is scarcely possible to over-estimate. The land jour- 
neys of Dr. Krapf in Eastern Africa extended to upwards of 
nine thousand miles, and were made mostly on foot — for the 
luxury of oxen, enjoyed by Dr. Livingstone, was beyond the 
reach of the German missionary in his travels from the coast 
into the interior. 



TRUBNER & CO.'S 



Recently published, uniform with " Tyll Owlglass," a 
Second Edition of 

THE TEAVELS 



SURPRISING ADVENTURES 



BARON MUNCHAUSEN. 



WITH THIRTY ORIGINAL ILLUSTRATIONS, 

(Ten full-page Coloured Plates and Twenty Woodcuts), by 
Alfred Crowquill. 

Crown 8vo. ornamental cover, richly gilt front and back, 
price 7s. 6d. 

" The travels of Baron Munchausen are perhaps the most astonishing 
storehouse of deception and extravagance ever put together. Their fame is 
undying and their interest continuous ; and no matter where we find the 
Baron, — on the back of an eagle, in the Arctic Circle, or distributing fudge 
to the civilized inhabitants of Africa, — he is ever amusing, fresh and new." 

Boston Post, Feb. 10, 1859. 

" A most delightful book. . . . Very few know the name of the author. 
It was written by a German in England, during the last century, and 
published in the English language. His name was Rudolph Erich Raspe. 
We shall not soon look upon his like again." 



LIST OF NEW PUBLICATIONS. 7 

THE EPIDEMICS 

OF 

THE MIDDLE AGES. 

FROM THE GERMAN OF J. F. C. HECKER, M.D. 

Translated by G. B. Babington, M.D. F.R.S. 

Third Edition, 

Completed by the Author's Treatise on Child-Pilgrimages. 

Octavo cloth, pp. 384, price 9s. 

CONTENTS. 

The Black Death — The Dancing Mania — The Sweating 
Sickness— Child-Pilgrimages. 



This volume is one of the series published by the Sydenham 
Society, and, as such, originally issued to its members only. 
The work having gone out of print, this new edition — the third 
— has been undertaken by the present proprietors of the copy- 
right, with the view not only of meeting the numerous demands 
from the class to which it was primarily addressed by its learned 
author, but also for extending its circulation to the general 
reader, to whom it had, heretofore, been aU but inaccessible, 
owing to the peculiar mode of its publication, and to whom it is 



8 TBUBNER AND CO.'S LIST OF NEW PUBLICATIONS. 



believed it will be very acceptable, on account of the great and 
growing interest of its subject-matter, and the elegant and 
successful treatment thereof. The volume is a verbatim reprint 
from the second edition, but its value has been enhanced by the 
addition of a paper on " Child-Pilgrimages," never before trans- 
lated ; and the present edition is therefore the first and only one 
in the English language which contains att d the contributions of 
Dr. Hecker to the history of medicine. 



"Dr. Hecker's volume is one of rare excellence, and one not to be met 
with and discussed lightly. He is the only historian of epidemics at present 
known, and he has the rare faculty of making a medical book an interesting 
one; likely, it appears, unfortunately, to be the only work upon the subject 
for many years." 



A DICTIONARY 

OF 

ENGLISH ETYMOLOGY. 

BY HENSLEIGH WEDGWOOD, ESQ. 
Vol I., embracing Letters A to D. 8vo. about 500 pages. 



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